Apprenticed in Snark and Magic
by SixPerfections
Summary: Rachel Bicchielli remembers her previous life, including her all-time favorite book series The Dresden Files. When suddenly she starts being able to do unexplainable things she realizes with slowly dawning horror that her favorite book series just became all too real. Learning magic from Harry Dresden and trying not to die is liable to drive her completely crazy. SI story.
1. Capitolo Uno - Rabbit Hole

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Uno.  
**  
ooOO0OOoo

It's kind of embarrassing but it took me seventeen years to realize I'd been reborn in a fictional universe. Some days I kind of wish I'd remained in blissful ignorance.

You'd think you'd be aware of it but in hindsight there are so many fictional worlds you could be reborn in and never know about it. Grimm? Harry Potter? Buffy? You could live an entire normal life and never realize that a TV show or book you'd read in a past life is your current reality today.

But I digress. What you need to know is this: soon after I turned seventeen I started experiencing some seriously weird stuff. Like, _really_ weird. Supernatural kind of weird. Stuff that frankly started to really freak me out.

For example one day I was eating cereal in my modest Midwestern home when my mom started nagging me – again – about getting out more and having a boyfriend. I'd grown to love my mother but she was a woman whose worldview seemed permanently frozen in time in the 1950's. If I didn't have a man and a close group of female friends to spend weekends with then clearly there must have been something wrong me and I was doomed to be an old spinster. She couldn't understand that I was perfectly happy being shy, introverted, and well – a _nerd,_ for lack of a better term.

One second I was eating the milk and cereal just fine before my mother got me especially irritated with her never ending and mildly insulting nagging. The next I put the spoon in my mouth and on reflex spit it out right away. It had tasted utterly vile all of a sudden. On closer inspection I noticed that all the milk in my cereal had curdled. Like, in the span of a second. With no logical explanation.

My mom of course closed her ears and insisted I must have added cottage cheese to my cereal and didn't remember doing so. Yes. That was my mother. After that I think I understandably kept anything strange that happened to myself.

The next thing that happened was also in a moment of anger. I was convinced that my AP History teacher hated me and in my mind that was confirmed when I got a B+ on my final paper when it was _clearly_ at least solid A- material. _At the very least_. I'd read some of the papers that got A's. That biased jerk totally had it out for me.

I was gripping the metal bar of a railing at school when I read that. I didn't even notice when my fingers made deep indents in the solid metal. When I saw what I had done my second thought was, irrationally, that I didn't want to get in trouble for damaging school property. My first though was obviously a very loudly whispered _What the fuck?._ I ran after that, eager to leave the scene of the crime. It was only after I was safe from the reprisals of school officials that it really started to sink in how impossible what I had done should have been.

Stuff like that just _kept happening_ no matter how much I wanted to ignore it. I won't lie, it freaked me the hell out. I also had also started to develop a sense of… something. Something different inside of me. Or maybe something I could sense in the world around me? I wasn't sure. But after a while it started to become impossible to ignore.

So I started doing some research like any sane modern day person would. I surfed the internet for days first looking for anything that hinted at some kind of rational explanation… which perhaps predictably turned up exactly zilch that looked even close to promising. It wasn't long before I started getting desperate and started looking into religious and new age explanations. Most of it was wishy-washy new age junk that was pretty much the same kind of stuff you could find anywhere in my last lifetime. Tibetan singing bowls and balancing crystals might be great and stuff but… this was real life. Serious stuff. Stuff that literally felt like life or death somehow and that would probably get me institutionalized for just talking about. So I kept digging and digging and digging hoping (and later _praying_ ) for something that might help. That might give me some sort of _explanation_ that I could understand.

Eventually after a thousand message boards and a million dead ends I was directed by one enthusiastic poster to an E-version of the Chicago yellow pages. Apparently there was a guy there who everyone in the community was convinced was the 'real deal'. Eventually I found it and… well I didn't exactly deal with what I found gracefully. As I read the ad my mouth hung open for about five minutes as I read the same lines over and over again, my mind frozen and playing the same words over and over like a broken, skipping gramophone.

 **Harry Dresden – Wizard**

 **Lost Items Found. Paranormal Investigations.**

 **Consulting. Advice. Reasonable Rates.**

 **No Love Potions, Endless Purses, Parties or**

 **Other Entertainment.**

I was positive that, no, the Dresden Files books didn't exist in this world. I knew because that had been my favorite book series of all time and I'd _looked_. I knew that there was no Jim Butcher here. Still just to make sure one more time I robotically opened up another window on my browser and went to Amazon. And looked. And looked. Nope. No Dresden Files books.

Sooo… that probably meant that no one would know to make a gag like this.

People on the internet seemed convinced that this guy was real.

But… that was nuts. Because if _Harry Dresden_ was real then that meant… fairies were real. And Naaglooshii. And four different flavors of vampires. And _eldritch abominations were constantly trying to break into this world to wipe out all life as we know it and the only thing holding them back was a sadistic psychotic queen who apparently wasn't very good at her job because said eldritch abominations kept sneaking into our world like_ ** _all the time_** _._

And… that was totally insane. So there clearly had to be a more rational explanation for there being a Harry Dresden ad, exactly as I remembered it, posted on the city of Chicago's yellow pages.

Maybe… Maybe someone _else_ from my last life was reborn here and placed that ad as a joke. Yeah. That was much more rational. That made a lot more sense. Had to be it. Reincarnation into an almost completely identical world was much easier to believe than magic and evil fairies and Santa actually existing and secretly being Odin in disguise.

Because that would just be crazy.

Still. I looked at the phone number teasing me on the screen and started to bite my nails, a habit my mother had tried unsuccessfully to completely get me out of for years. It had to be a prank. The world simply _didn't work like that_. The Dresden explanation that "magic comes from life" and that you could somehow use this force to make a snoopy doll cripple a psychotic super-werewolf ( _which shouldn't exist in the first place!_ ) using just a bit of blood… or you could use it to open doorways to a dimension that was out of Alice in Wonderland… or Holy Jesus _God was actually real here and his Archangels could do magic even come down and talk to you…_

That part actually shut down my brain for a minute before deciding to not think about that one for the time being. Especially since I was a Buddhist and had never believed in God in the first place.

Okay. So. Odds were this was all a prank. Somehow. And I was freaking out about nothing. That was the sane and logical explanation. Yet at the same time…

 _What if what I'm doing is actual magic?_ I thought as I chewed my nails down to unattractive stumps. _It would explain things wouldn't it? Oh boy. Does that mean this will continue to grow until I can't even use technology anymore?_ Another horrifying thought popped into my head. _If I screw up experimenting or get too overzealous am I going to get some humorless stuffy gits in grey cloaks kicking down my door to chop off my head?_

Somehow as much as I wanted to I couldn't fully convince myself that I was being silly or that all of it was simply in my head. I pulled out my cell phone and looked at it suspiciously wondering if it was moments away from shorting out. There was nothing to it. I was going to have to call that number. Just so I could confirm things one way or the other. _It's no big deal. Not a big deal at all. Just dial the number!_ I thought to myself as I swallowed nervously.

If this crazy ad was the real deal… then I couldn't afford to remain ignorant. I was salutatorian in my class after all. I'd always been hungry for learning. There was no way I could stand to remain ignorant of something this huge… even without the possibility of my life being in danger if I really could use magic.

I unlocked my phone and dialed the number.


	2. Capitolo Due - Dresden

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Due.**

ooOO0OOoo  
 _  
*Ring* *Ring* *Ring* *Ring* *Ring* *Ring*_

 _Click_

The male voice that picked up sounded rough. Tired. Bone-weary might have been a better description. The politeness in it was forced and the man on the other side already sounded like he didn't particularly want to be having this conversation.

The voice also sounded like _freaking_ _James bloody Marsters,_ without the phony English accent. Just like I remembered.

"Harry Dresden speaking," the voice said with forced politeness just this side of professional. "How can I help you?"

That was the moment I realized I should have probably thought of what I was going to say before picking up the phone. My mouth opened and closed a few times on its own as my brain tried to process a great many things at once, such as what I should say, how I should say it, and oh yeah, the man who was my favorite protagonist in a book series of all time might or might not have been on the phone with me at the moment. It was like… what would you say if you were suddenly on the phone Yoda? Suddenly my tongue felt entirely too big for my mouth.

"Hello?" said the man calling himself Harry Dresden, annoyance dipping heavily into his tone. "If this is a crank call I've got to tell you buddy: I'm _really_ not in the mood."

"I think I can do magic," I blurted out. "And I don't want to get my head chopped off."

I winced. Oh yeah. _Silver tongue and rapier wit, that's me._ Earth swallow me whole right now please.

There was a sudden silence on the other side and what sounded like a tired exhale. I could almost see the man on the other side running a weary hand through his hair. "Look…" so-called Harry Dresden began again, his voice a good deal more patient and less hostile this time. "Where did you get the idea that someone was going to come and chop off your head?"

Crap. _The whole White Council thing was supposed to be a secret wasn't it?_ That little detail had sort of slipped my mind when I'd started speaking without filters. I wasn't ready to open up the can of worms of everything that I might or might not know. Instead I made the snap decision to go with something that was probably believable.

"I've been doing some research and talking to a few people. There are rumors that sometimes scary men come and threaten people who are practitioners into not doing certain things. Decapitation may have been mentioned." Pause. "On second thought probably not how I should have opened up our conversation Mr., uh, Dresden." I can't tell you how bizarre it was to feel like I was possibly speaking to Harry _soddin'_ Dresden. It just… I might as well have been speaking to Bilbo Baggins for how believable (or unbelievable as it were) the whole thing actually was at the time.

"Uhugh," he said, a trace of skepticism in his voice. "Look, first of all – what's your name Miss?"

"Rachel Bicchielli," I replied instantly without thinking… before smacking my face with my palm. I wasn't supposed to just give my name away! At least not without altering my own pronunciation or something. At least I hadn't blurted out my middle name too to go along with it. Though at that point I wouldn't have been surprised if I somehow managed to pull that off in the next five minutes.

"Alright look Ms. Bicchielli. What you're experiencing may or may not be magic. Why don't you tell me what's been going on and we'll take it from there?"

Sounded reasonable enough though for some reason I still found myself nervous at the situation. Still, haltingly at first, and then with increasing confidence I began to tell him everything I had been experiencing for the past month or so. The milk, the instances of possible superhuman feats, how I think I may have caused a plant to double in size overnight before it died abruptly, how a squirrel that had been flattened by a car had started breathing for a few seconds as I walked next to it before going back to being dead. "Harry" didn't say a word as I rambled, my words coming faster and tumbling over each other as I vented my spleen. I'd started to go in depth about my growing fear of drinking milk and possible use of such an ability to ferment alcohol when his voice cut me off.

"Well Ms. Bicchielli, it does sound like you might have a considerable burgeoning magical talent," he said in carefully measured tones. Most of all he did _not_ sound very excited about it. That made me frown.

"Assuming I do have – magic. 'A considerable burgeoning magical talent' as you said," and boy did it feel awkward to be saying that kind of stuff out loud. "Why does it sound like you don't think it's a good thing?"

Mr. Dresden seemed a little taken aback by what I said. "What? No, no. Magic is a wonderful thing. It is the very stuff of life itself. It's very much a good thing, believe me."

"Then why the… grumpy unenthused response?" I asked as delicately as I could.

"Just – look kid, Ms. Bicchielli, right now isn't really a good time. I'm extremely busy with an important project. To be safe you'll probably need at least some degree of help if your magic really is as strong as it sounds…" he said before trailing off. "Look, in the meantime I've got some brochures that might help tide you over until I can get you set up with someone. Why don't you come by my office and pick up a few of them? They should be able to answer a great many of your questions. That's what I made them for in the first place."

 _The hell?_ Why did it sound like he was trying to pass me off for somebody else to teach me stuff that I needed to know? Learn to control your magic from a brochure? _Seriously?_ What happened to the legendary Harry Dresden weakness for anything female in distress? The guy was practically blowing me off.

If I kept going on the assumption that this was _the_ Harry Dresden – just what was going on in his life right now?

"I can't just come over and pick them up," I said, my voice holding a trace of concern and annoyance for him despite my best efforts to keep it neutral. "I live in Cleveland."

"Oh," he said sounding genuinely surprised. "Well if you have an address I could mail them to, I'd be happy to send a couple of them your wa-"

"Actually," I said cutting him off. "I'm going to be in Chicago soon since I'm… going to be going to the University of Chicago."

And holy crap I just pulled all of that literally right out of my behind. I had in no way been planning a trip to Chicago. I'd never been the least bit interested in going to the city until now. If it wasn't for this "magic" business I'd have been perfectly happy never setting foot there in my entire life.

Then again it wasn't _completely_ crazy. I was seventeen but I had skipped a year and a half. I was about a month away from graduating high school as salutatorian with an almost record setting number of AP credits. I would have been the valedictorian too if that smarmy parasite Benjamin Po wasn't such a shameless brownnosing ass kisser with all the staff. Point was if I _really, really_ wanted to I could probably get into U of C without too many problems. Not that me and my mom could really afford it. But with a single parent and my grades I'm sure I'd qualify for financial aid and-

"I… see," his voice said, pulling me back from my wandering thoughts. "Well we'll probably want to meet at some point when you're in Chicago then. Given how your magic is developing it probably shouldn't wait too long. Then I can get a better idea of how to help you." Boy did he sound tired. _Just what is wrong with you Harry Dresden-like person?_

I thought I should probably do the man a favor and get off the phone with him. It sounded to me like he was itching to be done with me and go back to his "important project". If he was anything like book Dresden that probably meant that lives were at stake and innocent people needed saving. I swallowed, suddenly feeling guilty at having intruded on his time. My problems weren't as important as all that in the grand scheme of things.

"I'll give you a call when I'm in Chicago," I said to him, having absolutely zero idea how I was going to possibly convince my old-fashioned, overprotective mom to let me take a trip to a major city three states away.

"Right. Until then Ms. Bicchielli." Then with zero fanfare he hung up. The abruptness of it left me feeling slightly miffed. _How rude._

I pulled my phone from my ear and just sat there staring off into space for the better part of half an hour. So. That had happened. I'd had a conversation with a man calling himself Harry Dresden, who seemed to take the existence of magic for granted and didn't seem to be surprised at all by the reality-breaking weirdness that had been going on in my life lately. He was from Chicago and sounded exactly like the actor from Buffy who narrated all the Dresden Files audiobooks (minus Ghost Story – what they were thinking not using Spike Marsters for that one I'll never know).

Yet I _still_ wasn't convinced that was the Harry Dresden from my favorite book series that I had read in my previous life. And I wouldn't be convinced, not anything close to 100%, until I got to see and talk to him in person. And until I saw some of the other characters from the books in the flesh. And until I saw something iconic like the Blue Beetle – assuming this wasn't after Changes and the Blue Beetle hadn't been crunched together with Thomas's shiny white Jag yet. And maybe he would also need to make some awful Star Wars reference for me to truly believe. Also, he had better not look like the guy from the TV show. I hated that guy.

It was then that my cell phone let out high pitched irritating noise that had me reflexively covering my ears. The noise went on for about five seconds before it slowly died with a whimper. Wincing at the unexpected aural pain I checked my phone. The screen was now fuzzy, the display looking like it was covered in white snow. I was confused for a few moments before it clicked. Magic. Wizard. Techbane aura.

Fuck.


	3. Capitolo Tre - New Acquaintance

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Tre.**

ooOO0OOoo

"University of Chicago?" my mother said, sounding positively aghast as she threw her hands up in the air. "But Chicago is so far away!"

"It's still in the Midwest," I said, a little bit annoyed at my mom's dramatic antics. "It's also one of the best schools in this part of the country. Besides I just want to check it out, not make a final decision."

My mother looked troubled, giving me big puppy eyes that I tried my best to ignore. "But what's wrong with staying near home?"

"Ohio doesn't have any schools that appeal to me all that much mom. Besides you know I've always been hoping to go out of state, find myself, spread my own wings, that kind of thing."

My mom – Darla was her name, and wow only now does it seem in any way important that she has the same name as a famous fictional vampire – looked at me with worried, tired eyes. "I know honey. I just worry about you. To be perfectly honest I don't want you moving out of state at all. It's too dangerous for a young woman on her own out there. You don't really know the kinds of men who are just waiting for any opportunity to prey on any young woman who is all alone on her own out there. What will you do if you're all alone and a man tries to take liberties with you?"

Oh no, we were _not_ having that tired old rapists-are-waiting-for-you-around-every-corner rationale derail this very important trip for me. It's not like I ever asked to do _that much,_ I was mature and responsible and a pleasure to have as a daughter damn it! I was working myself up to a very impassioned retort when my mother held up a hand to stop me.

" _BUT –_ But knowing you Rachel you'll find a way to do what you want no matter what. Either now or when you're eighteen, no matter what your dear mother says."

 _Oh no, not the Catholic guilt… I'm not even Catholic damn it._

"If you _have_ to move out of state," she said with an unhappy huff as she reached into her purse for a cigarette. She took the time to light it up and take a deep drag before continuing. I wrinkled my nose at that horrible smell that I hated. "If you have to move out then Chicago is probably the only place I'd feel comfortable sending you."

"Wait," I said, feeling suddenly blindsided. "What- why? I mean, I'm grateful you're saying that… which is _really_ weird you agreeing to something like this so fast by the way… just. What do you mean you'd feel comfortable sending me to Chicago?"

"Well I still have a few friends there." At my flabbergasted look she rolled her eyes and elaborated. "Come on Rachel. You know me and your father lived there for most of the time that we were married."

"What?" I said deadpan. "No mom. No. I in fact did _not_ know that. You've never told me you lived in Chicago. In fact you never want to talk about dad and always change the subject. So no, I really don't know much about your life together before he died." I paused as I tried to dig up what little I really knew. "I thought you and dad were from Milwaukee."

"Oh we were," my mom said, her expression turning wistful and pained as she sat down on the kitchen table. "Grew up there. We were high school sweethearts and got married a week after we graduated. Then a week after that we left Milwaukee in a beat up 1953 Ford F-100 he'd just won in a pool game with nary a penny to our name." She took a deep drag of her cigarette and let out a wistful sigh. "Made it to Chicago and somehow managed to actually not starve and do pretty well for ourselves. We were lucky, young and in love." Then she had to ruin the sort-of-sweet moment by shooting me reproving look. "Which is why I keep telling you its way past time you had yourself a steady boyfriend Rachel. How do you expect to get married if you can't even find a man to hold on to? I honestly don't know where I went wrong with you."

I rolled my eyes but kept my mouth shut. Nope. Not going to get sidetracked into _that_ ridiculous argument again.

ooOO0OOoo

That day I learned a lot more about my parent's past than I had since I was a little kid. As I thought about it it was kind of shocking how little I actually knew about their lives… especially that of my father in this life who'd died when I was still a baby. I didn't remember him since I don't really remember much of my time when I was that young. Still some part of me felt like I should honor his memory in some way.

As for Chicago it turned out mom still corresponded with a few of the friends she had made while living there. The one she couldn't stop raving about once she got started was the man who'd been my dad's best friend. Giovanni Marcello, an Italian immigrant. Being Italian instantly made him a good guy off the bat in my mom's books since she strongly identified with our Italian heritage. Also apparently the guy was loaded. Absolutely loaded. Somehow I got the impression this made my mom think he was even more trustworthy… don't ask me how that logic worked because I honestly don't know. Anyway I got to hear all about how 'dear Giovanni' had been one of the very first friends they had made when they moved to Chicago and how he had made his fortune as a real estate developer. After dad died mom couldn't stand to stay in the city anymore but she kept in touch with a few of their friends. Holiday cards and that kind of thing.

To make a long story short mom agreed to let me visit Chicago so long as I stayed with 'dear Giovanni'. Seeing as that was the best I was going to get – and frankly much better than I had expected – I quickly agreed… even though I knew mom wasn't the best judge of character. I just had to cross my fingers and hope this guy wasn't some kind of perv. Still if he was I was fairly certain I could handle myself. I didn't think I had much to worry too much about with some middle aged real estate developer.

I ended up getting what I wanted. If I'd been a more suspicious person I might have thought it all went entirely too easy. Eventually I would learn that you _most definitely_ examine all gift horses in the mouth. At the time though I was too busy patting myself in the back and feeling grateful for my good fortune to think anything of it.

I would learn. Oh I would certainly learn.

ooOO0OOoo

A month and a half later I stood in front of the mirror in my small bathroom giving myself one last look over before my flight. My looks were that of the quintessential Italian girl what with my father being full Italian and my mother being half. Olive skin, thick dark wavy hair, aquiline nose, dark eyes, the works. I scowled a little at my reflection and not for the first time. I couldn't help but wish I was just a little bit taller. Being a hair over five feet tall and with a really petite build I could see why my mom might worry a little extra about me even if I didn't necessarily agree with it. The girl looking back at me from the mirror didn't look like she could fight her way out of a wet cardboard box.

Which, to be perfectly honest, I probably couldn't. But that was still no reason to be so damn overprotective.

It also didn't help that I fell strictly in the 'cute' spectrum of things making me look younger than I was. Well whatever. Despite my gripes this was now _my_ body and I had grown fairly attached to it over the years. Looking younger than I was was bound to pay off at some point anyway.

Wearing jeans and a nice button down blouse along with some very light makeup I decided that I was as ready as I was going to get. I was ready. Ready to go to Chicago to… discover magic. And to tour the University of Chicago. I felt a few butterflies fluttering in my stomach. This would be the first time in this new life doing anything like going far from home all by myself. It was exciting and a bit nerve-wracking all at the same time.

My mom took me to the airport, nagging me the whole way and reminding me a hundred times that Giovanni would pick me up at the airport and not to wander off with anyone else (because I would have totally done so if she hadn't told me not to, of course). Long story short I got on the plane on time and without incident. I had a moment of panic when halfway through the flight the little TV on the plane made a few odd clicking sounds before half the screen died. However the plane managed to land without falling out of the sky so I chucked that one up as a win.

When I got to Chicago was when things really started to get interesting. I'd never really flown much in this life but from my last one I had had plenty of experience. Collecting my bag from baggage claim and navigating my way through the terminal like a pro I made my way to where the arriving passengers were picked up. Looking around it only took me a few moments to spot a man holding a sign with my name on it.

Approaching cautiously my first thought was that there was no way this man was Giovanni. He was too young for one and he was wearing a fancy chauffeur's uniform complete with a hat. He was tall and his well-developed muscles were obvious even through what looked to be an expensively tailored suit. Short dark hair cut in an almost military fashion made him even more intimidating. The man looked at me with a cool evaluating gaze as I approached and I'm not too proud to admit it made me more than a little nervous.

He didn't say anything right away when I got close to him so I cleared my throat awkwardly before addressing him. "Uh… Mr. Giovanni Marcello was supposed to pick me up?"

The man looked at me, his eyes flicking over my figure but I didn't get the sense that it was because he was checking me out. "Rachel Bicchielli?" he asked in a crisp baritone.

I nodded slowly. "Uh… yes?"

"ID please."

I gaped at him in a way I'm sure was quite unflattering. "ID? Why?"

"To confirm your identity," the man said stating the obvious. At least he said it in a professional way that didn't make me feel like an idiot. "Mr… Marcello asked me to make sure there weren't any mistakes."

I noticed him hesitate before saying his supposed boss's name and filed away that tidbit away for future consideration. Weighing my options I decided that this guy was most likely on the level about who sent him. I fished out my wallet from my small backpack and handed him my driver's license. After examining it and looking back and forth from the picture to me a few times he handed me the card back.

"Thank you. My name is Fred Noches and I'm Mr. Marcello's personal driver. Please allow me to carry your bags for you Ms. Bicchielli," the man said with a small smile, suddenly a lot friendlier and more personable than just a moment before.

"Uh, sure," I said before handing over the bag I'd checked in but hanging on to my backpack. He took it in stride before leading me out of the terminal. My eyes widened as we exited the automatic doors and I saw the vehicle he was leading me to.

It was a limo. A black stretch limo. Someone had sent a limo to pick me up at the airport? I looked at Fred and saw him opening the trunk of said limo. _Yup_. It looked like I was going to be riding a limo. I'd never ridden a limo before in my life. He closed the trunk after putting in my suitcase and opened the rear door holding it open like one of those fancy drivers from the movies. Which I guess was exactly what he was.

"Ms. Bicchielli?" Fred asked politely in his deep resonant voice when I stood there just gawking a bit too long. Blushing slightly I muttered an apology and climbed into the back seat. The guy shut the door for me before going up to the driver's side. In moments we were pulling away from the curve and diving into heavy traffic.

I looked around inside the limo. Now I didn't know much about limousines, or luxury vehicles in general, but the inside of that vehicle looked _expensive_. The seats were warmed leather that somehow felt miles above any other leather seat I'd ever tried. There was real wood. A small compartment filled with a robust selection of expensive alcohol. Also the limo was filled with state of the art electronics subtly hidden from view… which I prayed I wasn't going to mess up with just one ride in the limo. I was still getting used to the idea that technology and me were no longer mixing together all that well.

I found the intercom button and pressed it. "How long until we get there?" I asked. I wasn't entirely comfortable all alone in the cavernous back of the limo to be honest. I was constantly afraid I was going to break something.

"Should be about twenty minutes Ms. Bicchielli," came the polite reply over the com system. The screen between the back seat and the driver was up. After some contemplation I decided to just leave it that way.

True to his word some twenty minutes later we were pulling up to our destination. I say 'destination' because that's what it was in the same sense people use 'destination' when talking about vacations. I openly gaped as large ornate metal gates opened up letting the limo enter a sprawling estate. When I'd heard that Giovanni Marcello was loaded I figured he would have a couple of beach houses and a few fancy cars. This… this was an _estate_. As we drove I noticed the grounds were incredibly expansive and must have taken a small army of gardeners to maintain. There were Roman inspired sculptures everywhere. Stone walkways. Staircases. There were some structures I could make out that I couldn't see the purpose for. In the distance I caught a glimpse of the water. Was it a lake? Was this estate on the shore of one of the Great Lakes maybe? _Holy shit_.

When the mansion itself came into view… _wow_. It reminded me of Villa Vizcaya which I'd written a school report about years ago. It looked like a kickback to the roaring 20's but in all the best ways. White and gleaming the mansion looked like something any family of both money and taste would sacrifice a limb for. To say I was floored by the wealth of my mom's _buddy_ was an understatement. I mean we were like middle middle or even lower middle class. My mom was a nurse and a single parent. People like that just didn't have friends whose paychecks had several more zeros on it than theirs did.

I was finally snapped out of my gawking when Fred opened the car door for me. He was already standing there with my suitcase next to him waiting expectantly for me to step out. Slowly I pulled myself out of the car and couldn't stop myself from looking around like a wide-eyed tourist while he led me to the front door.

When he opened the door an impeccable tall and thin man with a pencil mustache, a black suit and white gloves was there waiting for us.

"This is Benito," Fred said gesturing at the man. "Follow him. He'll take you to the boss."

ooOO0OOoo

As Benito the manservant, butler, whatever led me through the house I started to get a certain irrational suspicion. I say irrational because I have no idea where it came from. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say it was an intuitive suspicion. Before I could really dwell on it however I was being led into a large and extremely well decorated office.

Behind the desk writing something was a man. When I walked in he put down the golden pen he had been writing with and smiled at me. His smile was wide, open and friendly. Inviting. Genuine. It was nice. In spite of myself that smile did a lot to put me at ease. That was before I started to take in all the details about him.

The Dresden Files had been my favorite book series. It even got the point where I could almost quote whole passages off it almost word-for-word straight from memory. A certain quote sprang to mind as I examined the man smiling at me from behind the desk. _His salt-and-pepper hair was cut short, and there were lines from sun and smiling etched into the corners of his eyes. His eyes were the green of well-worn dollar bills. He seemed more like a college football coach: good-looking, tanned, athletic and enthusiastic._

"Rachel," he said, looking at me with something that might have been close to affection. "Darla and Angelo's little girl. My God it's been close to… fifteen years since I last saw you and your mother." The man stood up and came from around the desk as I stood frozen, staring at him with my mouth partly open. He closed the distance between us and held out his hands, a friendly and welcoming smile on his face. Robotically I did what was expected and slipped my hands into his. He squeezed them affectionately, the effect somewhere in between that of a handshake and a hug.

Something red caught my attention out of the corner of my eye and my eyes flickered briefly in that direction. There was a man standing in a corner not immediately visible from the front door of the office. Red hair. Huge. _Really_ huge. The man looked like he could crush a coconut with one hand if he really wanted to. That or someone's skull.

 _The impression was reinforced by the men he kept with him. Cujo Hendricks hulked like an all-pro player who had been ousted for extreme unnecessary roughness._

I looked at the middle aged man holding my hands, my mouth suddenly feeling dry as the deserts of Arabia. All of a sudden it clicked into place. _Giovanni Marcello._ Giovanni was the Italian form of the Biblical name John. Marcello was an Italian last name, the diminutive of Marco. What do you get when you Americanize the Italian name Giovanni Marcello?

"It's a pleasure to meet you Mr. Giovanni," I managed to squeak out.

"Please Rachel," he said with that same winning smile. "Call me Johnny. I hope that in time you'll be comfortable enough to call me Uncle Johnny."

 _Oh my God._

Over by his desk a lightbulb exploded.


	4. Capitolo Quattro - New Friends

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Quattro.**

ooOO0OOoo

Early the next morning I found myself once again in the back of a car being driven around – thankfully not in a limo this time – by Marcone's personal driver, Fred Noches. My eyes were burning and I was exhausted from lack of sleep. It didn't matter that I'd been given a guest bedroom that could have been fit for a queen or that I'd laid most of the night on a mattress that must have been created using magic given how comfortable it was. I'd still stayed up most of the night, clutching the covers under my chin and staring wide-eyed at the ceiling. It wasn't every night a girl got to stay as a guest in the Gatsby-tier mansion of a fictional Mob boss.

A Mob boss who came across as extremely nice and wanted me to call him "Uncle" Johnny.

What the fuck had my life turned into?

And how the fuck did my Mom not know her _Dear Giovanni_ was actually a notorious Mob boss?

Oh wait. This was Darla that we were talking about. This was woman who had once tried to convince me that since Fascism was invented by an Italian then it couldn't possibly be as bad as everybody said. _So that question more or less answers itself now doesn't it?_

Ugh. I threw my head back on the car seat not-at-all dramatically with a sound of abject frustration. _What the hell am I going to do now?_

"Everything all right Ms. Bicchielli?" asked Fred from the front. The sound of his voice made me flinch. For a second there I'd forgotten that I had company.

Or maybe a _babysitter_ would be a more accurate a term.

"Fine," I said not-at-all sulkily from the back of the late year Lincoln Town Car I was being driven in this time. Maybe I would have enjoyed the experience if I wasn't so worried about all the strings that might come attached with it.

Things descended into an awkward silence before Fred cleared his throat. "Mr. Marcone wanted me to remind you that he made dinner plans for the two of you tonight. He also wanted me to convey that he looks forward to getting to know you better and will gladly provide any assistance that he can if you choose to move to Chicago."

I remembered. "You don't say," I said dryly. Sadly I wasn't able to keep all of the trepidation out of my voice. Thankfully Fred didn't call me out on it.

The previous day, after meeting "Uncle" Johnny and the unexpected electrical surge that blew up an innocent light bulb, I'd made excuses that I was tired from my flight as fast as was polite… because _not_ being on my best polite behavior had seemed like a downright terrible idea. Marcone had been unfailingly polite and charming, had apologized for being _rude_ for keeping while I was tired, and then had his slightly creepy manservant/butler take me to what was to be my room… but not before assuring me that we would have dinner the following evening. For the life of me I hadn't been able to think of any sane way of saying _no_.

I'd say I had butterflies in my stomach just thinking about it, but they were more like jumping carp than anything else. I would have been chewing on my nails nervously but was too tense to even do something as simple as that. I also didn't want to get the car dirty.

I sighed and sat in silence, the absence of sound somewhat awkward between the driver and I now that I didn't have a handy black screen to separate me from the front of the vehicle. As the minutes rolled by and the more I looked at Fred's face through the rear view mirror the more and more familiar he seemed to me for some reason. Before long it really started to bug me. I had the niggling feeling I'd seen him somewhere before.

"Have you ever been on TV or something?" I finally broke down and asked him. Irritating curiosity won over trepidation of interacting with a Mobster.

"No," he said, looking at me through his dark glasses over the rearview mirror. "But in the past I've occasionally worked as a face model."

 _Face model?_ I squinted and scrutinized his features further. Now where could I have seen them before? Wait. If you removed the buzz cut hair, added a few earrings, and then a goatee…

"Oh my gosh!" I sat up and gushed as it suddenly hit me. "You're Rude from _Advent Children_!"

He looked at me though the rearview mirror, a small smile quirking on the side of his lips. "Yes I was the face model for that. You're a fan I take it?"

" _Hell yes,_ " I said enthusiastically, practically bouncing on my seat. "That is so cool! I'm going to have to go back and look for your name in the credits."

I don't often play video games, but when I do, it's _Final Fantasy_.

Fred looked amused. "I didn't actually do a whole lot. I'll admit it was pretty neat to see my face animated though."

"Will you tell me how they captured your face? Was it done in Japan? Did see or meet Nobuo Uematsu at any point?"

Fred humored me and answered all my questions patiently as we drove to our destination. Overall he was extremely nice handling my extended interrogation and even joked around with me a little bit. For a few minutes there I even forgot that he was a Mobster at all.

ooOO0OOoo

Our destination that morning was the reason I'd told everyone I'd wanted to come to Chicago in the first place. The University of Chicago was impressive in all the pictures I'd seen, but it was even more so in real life. There was a lot of old money in the U of C and it showed. The campus was immaculate, looking like someone's idealized Ivy League dream given flesh in the Midwest. The architecture was a mixture of Victorian Gothic and Collegiate Gothic along with some very modern buildings that were made entirely of glass. The old mixed almost seamlessly with the new and you could almost feel the history and academia pouring out of the walls of the place. Climbing vines, red brick buildings, and an almost palpable sense of competence in the air.

It was very nearly love at first sight.

I was in a group with a half dozen other perspective students being given the tour by one of the advisers that had been working for the school for the past twenty years. Many of the would-be students brought their families so it was a rather large group that went from place to place, building to building as the woman leading us displayed an almost encyclopedic knowledge of the campus and its history. I was gratified to note that I was certainly the youngest person in the group shooting for Freshman admission. Most likely I was also the most qualified candidate as well even though I was at least two years younger than any of them. _Suck on that suckers._

The only thing that soured the experience a little bit was my constant shadow. Fred Noches might have upped his coolness factor in my book by a magnitude or two but nothing about him exactly screamed "subtle" or "family friendly". In the black suit and dark glasses he was wearing he could have easily passed for a bodyguard or secret service agent and everything about him now that we were in public seemed to scream "professional hardass". Even I was a little intimidated by him and I'd been joking with the guy just a little while before.

After the tour finally wound down we were taken to the administration building and students were offered "pre-counseling" to see what options might work best for them. The counselor assigned to me was a middle aged lady with a wide smile that looked a little bit too rehearsed.

"Ms. Bicchielli," she began, "If you don't mind we'll review your application and then we can discuss academic options, okay sweetie?"

I hated how people saw me and felt inclined to use words like "honey" or "sweetie" but decided to let it slide this time. I currently had bigger fish to fry and needed a bit of her goodwill. I smiled a smile that felt a little forced and chirped, "that would be great!"

My fake smile slowly gave way to a self-satisfied one as I saw her eyebrows go up as she reviewed my application. Yes lady, those are all the AP classes I took. That's right, those _are_ my AP placement test scores. You're shocked that my resume is so damn impressive and I'm only seventeen? Oh, I'd love to come to your school, thank you very much for asking.

"Well," the woman said, putting down the application and giving me a slightly more genuine professional smile. "I can say with confidence that you'll have no problem getting into any program that you choose to apply to should you choose to attend our institution."

"That's great to hear," I said with my own professional plastic smile. Ugh. I hated being so fake.

"So why don't we discuss what fields of study you might want to specialize in? By what you've shown up to this point I think you could go in literally any direction that you want and still be incredibly successful."

ooOO0OOoo

The meeting went on for a while. In the end I was undecided on what to major in, or if I should double major, and what sort of advanced study program I should participate in if I decided to come to U of C… thankfully the advisor told me that there was no rush to make up my mind. She also started to subtly but eagerly push me to make U of C my final decision. It flattered my ego a bit. It also gave me bit of leverage to ask for a small favor.

"Thank you Ma'am," I said as the meeting was wrapping up. "Before I go, would you mind if I used your phone for a little bit? My cell phone broke and I have an important call I need to make."

"Certainly dear," the woman said with a smile.

"Um… could I take it in private?" I said, giving her my best wide-eyed, innocent look. "It's just… kind of private. I just need to make a call for a few minutes. Please?"

It probably was a bad idea to leave a perspective student unattended in the office of an academic advisor… but after some visible reluctance the woman agreed and left me alone in the room. Sometimes looking harmless had its advantages. With nervous, sweaty fingers I picked up the phone. While the University of Chicago was a nice pleasant surprise and diversion it wasn't the real reason that I'd come to Chicago. After hesitating for a few moments I dialed Dresden's office number which I'd memorized over a month before.

The phone rang half a dozen times before someone sounding a little breathless picked up on the other end. "Harry Dresden's office. William Borden speaking."

William Borden? _Shit._ My mind went into overdrive as it began to put together the pieces and fill out the relevant information. William Borden, AKA "Billy" Borden, shapeshifter, leader of the Alphas, long time friend and ally of Harry Dresden. All in all one of the Good Guys. But what was he doing in Dresden's office? Or better yet, _when_ would he have had a reason to be picking up his phone?

There was only one time that sprung to mind. At the start of _Summer Knight_ Billy tells Dresden he's been stopping by his office, cleaning out the place and taking calls from his clients. Which… might explain why my phone call with Dresden felt like such a brush off. If my suppositions were correct then Harry had to be in the middle of dealing with the aftermath of the whole Susan debacle. _Crap._

Definitely not a good time to come around asking for a favor. Or magical instruction. I palmed my face. _Double crap._

"Hello?" asked the voice on the other end when I took too long to respond.

"Er, yes," I began, feeling a little bit off balance as I was trying to process all the possible implications of the information I'd just gotten. "My name is Rachel Bicchielli," I said, making sure to fudge up the pronunciation a little. "I spoke to Mr. Dresden about a month ago. He said it was very likely I had an, uh, 'considerable burgeoning magical talent'. Mr. Dresden was the only person I found that might be able to help me make sense out of all this and he said to give him a call when I got into town. I'm from Cleveland and I'm only going to be in Chicago for a short while. Do you think it would be possible for me to get a hold of Mr. Dresden today?" I asked hopefully. Somehow I had a feeling about what the answer was going to be however.

"I'm… afraid that most likely won't be possible," said Billy carefully and apologetically. "Mr. Dresden is… extremely busy with a number of high profile cases right now."

"You don't say," I commented dryly.

" _Very_ high profile," said Billy and I could almost picture him nodding to himself. _Hogwash._ Even if I didn't already strongly suspect that he was full of it the leader of the Alphas apparently wasn't all that skilled in the art of not sounding guilty when you were telling a big whopper of a lie.

"So I'm just sunk then?" I said, most definitely not sounding at all pouty. "I _really_ need to get some help Mr. Borden. This magic stuff just keeps getting more and more out of control."

And it was. I thought the instances of accidental magic would calm down over time. If anything they only seemed to be getting worse and coming more often. The exploding light bulb the day before was only the latest in the number of random things that kept happening around me over and over again. I didn't want to wait until something happened at a _really_ bad time.

"Well…" said Billy thoughtfully, obviously trying to think of something that might help as I heard some rustling papers on the other end of the line. "We've, ugh… got some brochures about the very basics of magic and stuff that Mr. Dresden made. It looks like they have some good information. Maybe you could stop by and pick them up?"

I groaned. _Not the damn brochures again!_ "I guess if I have no other choice," I said, now sounding distinctly irritated even as I tried to control it. "However I don't have a car." There was no way I was asking Fred to drive me to Harry Dresden's office. That would just raise _waayyy_ too many questions.

"I… suppose I could mail them to you if you gave me your address?" Billy said, sounding apologetic.

My eyebrow twitched. I didn't come all the way to Chicago just for them to mail some damn brochures home to Cleveland. Before I left I was going to shed some light on this whole… crazy business… I'd found myself in since I'd started curdling milk and growing plants and putting dents in steel and all sorts of… other stuff. It was at that point that inspiration struck me.

"You wouldn't be coming by way of the Universtiy of Chicago any time soon would you?" I asked, already knowing the answer.

"Yes," he said, sounding a bit surprised. "I'm a junior there actually."

"Small world," I said, somehow amused at having a leg up with my knowledge that I shouldn't really have. "I'm at the school touring the campus. I might be starting here next semester. Do you think if you're coming back this way soon, maybe, possibly, you could hand me those brochures?"

"Yes. Actually that wouldn't be a problem Ms. Bicchielli. I was actually planning to start heading back that way in a few minutes."

 _Perfect._ "That's great," I said, putting a little extra into the genuine relief that I felt. "What about you Mr. Borden? Are you a… Wizard… like Mr. Dresden is? Can you do any sort of magic? I'd love to be able to talk to someone who's had similar experiences. It might help me make sense of this whole stressful mess."

"Ugh," said Billy as he seemed to debate how to answer. "I'm not a Wizard like Dresden but I'm not… entirely unfamiliar with the magic side of things either. In fact there are a few good friends of mine and a few other people right there at U of C who are not exactly 'normals' if you catch my drift. Maybe you have time to sit down for a cup of coffee and I could give you the lay of the land?"

Wow. He was genuinely being a nice guy. I didn't even have to badger him to sit down and talk to me, he just up and offered it up himself. I'd half suspect he was trying to set himself up to have a chance with me if I didn't know he was already madly in love with a werewolf named Georgia. A genuine smile came to my lips.

"That would be wonderful. Thank you."

ooOO0OOoo

On the first floor of the Regenstein Library there was a small student-run coffee shop named eX Libris. It had a small kitchen, relaxed atmosphere, and _really_ looked like a place that I could see myself coming to in order to catch a break or just to study a little bit. It was only one of four student run coffee shops on campus. The more I contemplated the idea of attending the University of Chicago the more it seemed like the perfect place for me.

The perfect place for me academically at any rate. The whole other 'mystical' side of the equation was something I was going to have to take into account as well, of course.

Thankfully, and after much protesting and some unsightly begging, I'd convinced Fred to come after I did and make himself unobtrusive in a corner while I talked to a "student leader" about some exciting academic opportunities. As much as looking like a Final Fantasy character (or was it the other way around?) bought you points with me I was frankly getting sick of having him over my shoulder constantly. Especially when I was doing things and having conversations I _really_ didn't want him to report to his boss.

Walking in first I looked around the half-full Café, looking for Billy. He said he'd be wearing a red sweater that would be hard to miss. Sure enough, sitting on a table near the back was a young man. I hung back and scrutinized him before approaching. He was handsome-ish, with short brown hair and brown eyes. That was something of a surprise because… well, I didn't remember if the Dresden books ever went into that much detail about what he looked like. However he _did_ match up to what the books had to say about his appearance. Sitting down I got the impression that he was around five and half feet tall (still way taller than me) and he was _built_ like he 'worshiped the Gods of Bowflex' in Harry's own words. I bit my lip, suddenly feeling nervous.

First Marcone, now Billy Borden? Part of me, a part that was dying a slow and lingering death but still remained, still refused to believe that all of this was as real as it appeared to be. Could that more-or-less normal looking guy really turn into a wolf at the drop of a hat? More importantly, could _I_ learn to do something like that? More importantly still, did all the epic bad juju that I'd read about in the Dresden Files books really exist here as I remembered and was slated to happen, exactly as I remembered it?

Well. Mind and reality shattering questions sometimes needed to be ignored and repressed for as long as possible. For now I had a possible-maybe werewolf to (hopefully) befriend and speak to.

I put on a winning smile and marched right over to his table. He looked up as I approached and I could see confusion flashing across his face. Not letting it deter me I pulled up a chair across from him and sat down, going for as much charm and friendliness as I possibly could.

"So, I hear you have some brochures for me?" I said cheerily. Operation 'charming perky cute girl' was go.

"Ugh," he said looking at me oddly. What was his problem?

"Hello?" I said with a small frown, waving my hand in front of him. That seemed to make him realize he was being rude. Billy sat up and gave me an apologetic smile.

"I'm sorry," he said, both polite and friendly. "Was it your… older sister? Or something? That I talked to on the phone?" He looked around briefly. "Is Rachel coming?"

Huh? Most of the friendliness dropped off my face. "I'm Rachel. Who else would I be?"

His eyes snapped back to me, and he looked startled. "But…" he said, scrutinizing me with a confused face. For some reason it looked like he was having a hard time processing that information. "But… but you can't be, like, a day over fifteen. At the most."

 _What._

"Ummm…" he said, clearing his throat awkwardly as my gaze turned frosty, "you just look entirely too young to be going to this University, that's all. No offence."

I… couldn't _fucking_ believe what I was hearing. Something must have shown in my face because Billy started looking more uncomfortable.

"Look," he said holding his hands up in a gesture of peace. "I know there's child prodigies out there and all, I just didn't expect to be meeting one right now is all. I'm sure you've totally, 100% earned your spot here."

 _Did he just call me a_ _ **child**_ _?_

Oh no. He did not go there. I may be small, and petite, and look younger than I am, but I wasn't about to let anyone, werewolf or not, condescend to me because of that.

I opened my mouth to unload a well-deserved dose of feminine righteous fury. My tirade however was derailed when a young woman stepped into my line of sight and smacked Billy rather hard on his shoulder.

"Stop digging honey. At this point the only thing you can do is alternate between saying 'I'm sorry' and 'You're right'. I thought you would have picked up on that after dating me for so many years," the newcomer said, scolding Billy playfully.

I felt some of my ire drain away as I turned and looked at the newcomer. Rail thin, dirty blonde and about six feet tall with long, long legs. Her face, like the rest of her, was long with a pointy chin but somehow with her it really seemed to work. Her physical appearance along with having called Billy 'honey' made it really easy to figure out who she was.

"Hi," she said with a practiced but genuine smile as she turned to me. The newcomer held her hand out for me to shake. "Georgia Winterwood. I hear that you might be joining our little group of misfits here at the University?"

-


	5. Capitolo Cinque - New Mentor (Sort Of)

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Cinque.**

ooOO0OOoo

My personality suffers from a strange dichotomy that does, on occasion, make me feel a wee bit mental.

You see, when I have a goal in mind, some objective to achieve, some clear cut and specific finish line I'm working towards, it's very easy for me to become very outgoing. I pounce on things, my manner can become somewhat forceful and bossy, and I have no trouble putting myself out there full-stop in order to achieve whatever important goal I'm currently pursuing. It's something about me that has allowed me to experience a great deal of success in my short seventeen years of life and can often make me feel unstoppable.

The rest of the time, however, when I'm more or less just interacting with people socially…

Looking up at Georgia's smiling face I fidgeted nervously before reaching out and shaking her offered hand. Now that I was faced with both Billy and Georgia… I didn't have a specific plan in mind. Thus I reverted back to feeling a bit like just another socially awkward nerd. My handshake was stiff and robotic and I was suddenly uncomfortably aware of how much I had neglected social interactions in order to pursue my own intellectual pursuits.

But… why would I ever bother interacting with people when none of them would really appreciate my obsession with research into reincarnation? Why would I talk to people who would never understand why I had converted to Buddhism after reading the _Mūlamadhyamaka-kārikā_ , one of the most significant philosophical and epistemological texts of all time that nobody has ever heard of? How could I explain that 99% of the activities "normal" people enjoyed just bored me to tears because I could see how utterly pointless it was to invest in something that I could not take with me life after life, assuming this whole reincarnation thing ended up happening again and again, as I suspected it would?

Maybe I was getting a little off track, but the point was… I had neglected some skills in favor of others.

"Hi," I said, my voice coming out embarrassingly high pitched.

Georgia smiled at me beatifically – it was a pretty nice smile – before sitting down next to Billy. I saw them exchange a tender glance and was pretty sure Georgia reached over to lay her hand on his leg affectionately. Unbidden I felt a tiny bit of envy at the relationship they seemed to have.

They both turned their attention back towards me, and I couldn't help but feel uneasy at being the center of attention. By some unspoken agreement Georgia took point in the conversation. I could easily believe that between the two of them she was the more socially adept partner… especially given how foot-in-the-mouth Billy Borden had just been showing himself to be.

"Rachel right?" Georgia began. "I'm sorry to just drop by unexpected. When Billy told me about your conversation and that you might be starting here I wanted to come meet you in person. I also didn't want him getting into too much trouble on his own."

It was all said lightly and good naturedly but I could read between the lines. Georgia had shown up unexpected and unannounced because I had come out and outright admitted I was from the spooky side of things. Given all the nasty predatory supernatural stuff that was out there I guess I couldn't really blame them for being careful and bringing backup.

It was still irritating to get blindsided though. The new variable was throwing off my game.

I fidgeted, eyes flickering back and forth between the two of them before settling my gaze on the table. Why was this so hard all of a sudden? "Uh, no big. I could have been… something ugly and terrifying. I understand."

"Ugly and terrifying?" said Billy, looking amused at the prospect as he looked me up and down. "Yes, I suppose I could see that," he said teasingly.

I sent him a mild glare and I'm pretty sure Georgia briefly dug her nails into his thigh for that one. Who would have though Billy Borden would be as smooth with the ladies as a metal sea urchin?

Or maybe he was just having an off day. He couldn't constantly mess up this badly with all the girls that were in the Alphas. Surely.

Georgia turned back to me. "Don't get me wrong, the University is pretty safe. But, well, we've learned to be cautious. There's a lot of freaky stuff out there that could potentially get you in trouble."

Interesting thing was that at this point I probably knew more about the _freaky stuff_ out there than Georgia or the Alphas did. It wasn't until much later that Dresden came clean and told them all the details of the White Council and all the other "secret" stuff that was normally hidden from minor practitioners. This was still assuming I could really trust all the knowledge I had in my head of course.

I nodded, not trusting my voice to speak. By habit I let my long hair fall forward and cover half of my face. It was something I did when I was feeling uncomfortable with a conversation. Damn it. Normally I could just walk away from or ignore uncomfortable conversations… or just book it when I started feeling so damnably shy.

"So…" began Georgia leadingly. "What kind of stuff have you experienced so far?"

I was saved from having to answer right away by someone coming over to take our order. Thank you, brunette waitress with _waaay_ too many facial piercings. After ordering an ice coffee with lots of cream and sugar I had a few moments to think of what I wanted to say.

First of all, I couldn't just continue to be super shy and awkward. _Goal, you need a goal_. What then? Originally it had been to befriend Billy and pump him for information. The problem was that while I was confident interacting with someone in a one on one situation speaking to a group had always been far more difficult for me. What then though?

What was it that I was really looking for?

Looking at Billy and Georgia ordering coffee and scones a novel thought occurred to me. Maybe what I really needed… was a genuine and open dialogue.

Whoa. Weird. But as I bit my lip the idea started to make more and more sense.

Maybe… maybe my goal should be to share my experiences. A free exchange of ideas as it were. Minus any mentions of "reincarnation" or "unexplainable memories" of course.

It would require a bit of trust. But I felt like I could trust Georgia and Billy, if only because I knew they were very much some of the Good Guys.

Also the danger was probably minimal.

Well. That settled it then. Operation "share relevant experiences" was go.

"Well…" I began once the waitress left, already starting to feel more confident. "I guess it all began with the curdled milk incident a few months back while I was eating breakfast with my mother…"

ooOO0OOoo

Despite being four years older than me, and probably not as intelligent (not that many people were), I was surprised to find that I really enjoyed my conversation with Billy and Georgia. They both proved to be interesting conversationalists, obviously were very well educated, and turned out to be _fantastic_ listeners… which was good because I've been known to ramble a bit on occasion when I get into something. They listened to me recount the last few months of my life for almost half an hour, only interrupting occasionally with a thoughtful question, before they began to share some of their own experiences in the supernatural.

Oh they didn't just come out and admit they could turn into wolves. That really struck me as more of a "second date" type conversation. Still apparently there was a girl on campus who could light candles with her mind and could give some freakily accurate Tarot readings. There was also another girl who could apparently levitate things… and who was also apparently something of a bitch, though Georgia put it in much nicer terms than that. The previous year there had been some skinless bobcat (?) killing animals and pets near the university. It had been "taken care of" though they had been tight fisted about the details. In the sub-basement of the physics building there was apparently a ghost that Billy, Georgia, and pretty much every one of their friends had seen at some point but who as far as they could tell was completely harmless.

Then of course they told me about Dresden. Annoyingly they kept things vague and left out any of the truly juicy stuff but they told me enough to make my eyebrows go nearly up to my hairline. How he could find people with tracking spells, reliably, as long as he had something tied to them. How they had seen him make fire and push things with invisible force. How he had a coat that was many times tougher and more durable than any article of clothing had any right to be. My disbelief and incredulity did not have to be faked, as much as it seemed to amuse them.

Yes, all of that was stuff that I had known already. Intellectually. But hearing somebody talk about it after having witnessed it personally… well. As I'd said I was still in the process of accepting and internalizing that all of this was real.

Things settled into a brief silence as all of us drank from our respective coffees. Then Billy addressed me with a bit of a teasing smirk on his face.

"So you resurrected roadkill huh?"

The words made my cheeks warm up and I crossed my arms. "Among other things. I was just focusing on the dead squirrel and it took a few breaths. No big deal." Pause. "No weirder than all the other stuff that's been happening to me at any rate."

"You know," Georgia said as she tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Usually when someone can do something 'special' it's only one thing. Talk to ghosts, telekinesis, transform… whatever it is it's usually pretty limited. However the things you've been describing have been all over the place. It definitely seems broader than the usual talent."

"Dresden is the only person we know who's like that," Billy said to Georgia thoughtfully… and maybe even a bit worriedly.

"Yeah, I guess you're right," his girlfriend said with a nod.

When I heard them talk about Dresden… I got the feeling they found his powers somewhat intimidating. A bit scary even. That they respected and liked the guy was clear enough but that didn't mean they couldn't also be wary of the things he could do. Given the things a wizard could do if they decided to go bad, it was an entirely reasonable response for people to be a little bit… _extra aware_ where wizards were concerned.

"Dresden made it sound like I was like him," I said quietly, both in the spirit of sharing and to test the waters.

Billy looked reluctantly impressed and Georgia grimaced a little. She quickly wiped away that expression and gave me a bit of a wry smile. "If that's true then I hope you don't end up attracting as much trouble as he does."

 _You and me both wolf-girl_. _You and me both._

"Speaking of attracting trouble," said Billy, his body language remaining relaxed but his voice suddenly going low pitched and serious. "Some guy that looks like bad news came in and sat down a little while ago. He's trying to be discreet but it looks like he's especially interested in you, Rachel. Anyone you know?"

It took me a second to process who it might be before I rolled my eyes. Just to make sure I looked behind me. Sure enough, there was Fred sitting on a table near the entrance, reading a paper and keeping me well within his peripheral vision. With his dark sunglasses on it was really hard to tell that he was even paying any attention to me, so how Billy had scoped him out I had no idea. Just to be a bit of a pest I waved cheekily at him. He looked over in my direction briefly before bringing his newspaper up to his face and blocking me from view. Jerk.

"Who is that?" asked Georgia. I was kind of really surprised by the worry I heard in her voice. When I turned back to look at her she was alternating between looking at me with concern and shooting suspicious looks at Fred.

I sighed, maybe just a tad bit dramatically. How to explain this?

"I'm staying with an… umm a friend of the family," I said, squirming a bit uneasily at referring to the Baron of Chicago in that way. "He's put a bodyguard with me while I'm in town." That was more or less the truth wasn't it? I sighed in annoyance. "Not sure if it was his idea or my Mom's but I'm stuck with the guy for now."

Billy raised an eyebrow at that but Georgia nodded and took the revelation in stride, even if she didn't seem thrilled about it. It was then that I remembered that Georgia was supposed to come from money. Old, Big money on the Gold Coast of Lake Michigan. Maybe she wasn't a stranger to being saddled with a babysitter.

It was then that I got a certain idea. I tilted my head down and raised my eyes up, giving Georgia big sad puppy eyes. "To be honest I'm not entirely comfortable with him. I wish I could just look at the University a bit on my own without some strange man following me around."

"Do you want us to help you ditch him?" said Georgia immediately, leaning in close and whispering, her eyes both concerned and determined.

I would have grinned but that would have ruined the image I was going for. Georgia just went right ahead and jumped to exactly what I was hoping for. I was really starting to like this girl! It was also a bit… touching that she was so eager to help when we barely knew each other. Looking over at Billy's expression I knew right away that he would be completely on board with helping me out too.

I hid half my face behind my hair shyly and gave them both a grateful, conspiratory little smile. "I would _really_ like that."

ooOO0OOoo

We only stayed for a few more minutes. I was… really surprised by how nice and welcoming the two of them were. We exchanged contact information, promised to keep in touch, and they even insisted on picking up the whole check… I _really_ tried talking them out of it, but it was a losing proposition arguing two versus one, and in the end I simply got them to agree to let me pay for the coffee next time. At the end they also seemed genuinely pleased at the idea of me coming to study at the University of Chicago.

It was odd. I… never made friends easily. Or at all. Mostly because I never felt like I had anything meaningful in common with anyone. However with Georgia and Billy we had the supernatural… maybe it made me a snob, but having that in common made me feel like talking to them wasn't just a waste of my time.

It was… nice.

Really nice.

Another tally on the "Pros" column for moving to Chicago then I supposed.

Even if I had the sinking feeling that Georgia really wanted to go all "protective big sister" on me. Not really sure how I felt about that one.

In the end ditching Fred turned out to be surprisingly simple. Georgia stood up and asked me to go to the bathroom with her loudly enough for anyone who was paying attention to our table in the small Café to pick up on it. For once the ridiculous habit other girls had to flock to the bathrooms together worked to my advantage. I agreed and we went to the bathroom, holding hands, whispering and giggling like some horrifying movie parody of high school girls. As degrading as it was sinking to such a low however it completely worked.

Once we were out of sight down the short bathroom hallway Georgia took me through a side door that led to the kitchen. Some of the student staff looked surprised to see us but nobody stopped us as she took me out the back. Briefly I wondered if Fred was going to get chewed out by Marcone or if my own personal little Rude would even let on that he lost track of me for a while.

Thinking about it I felt a bit guilty ditching the guy honestly. But I wasn't about to let that stop me... especially when I'd just gotten my hands on Dresden's famous brochures and wanted to go over them in private.

When we got outside Georgia surprised me by briefly pulling me into a hug. I froze in shock, both from the unexpected show of affection and from my face ending up buried in between her breasts due to our _considerable_ height difference. Thankfully she let me go before it could really start to get awkward.

"Have a safe trip home," she said after she separated from me. "I really hope you'll come to Chicago. But if you don't, keep in touch anyway okay?" Damn. I wasn't used to someone being so friendly and welcoming. It wasn't something I remembered from her in the series.

Blushing lightly I crossed my arms self-consciously. "Yeah. Okay. You're interesting enough for the most part I guess," I said without really thinking about what was coming out of my mouth.

Georgia laughed lightly at that. "Well, if you don't I'll track you down," she said jokingly, though with a look in her eye that made me think that maybe she was being serious. "Take care of yourself okay?"

"You too," I said, suddenly feeling awkward at the whole social thing again. "And take care of Billy too. I get the feeling that he needs you to keep him straight."

"He does all right by himself. Mostly," she said in good humor. "Speaking of which you should get going. Big bad bodyguard is probably only a couple of minutes from going to look for you. We'll be here when you decide to come back. Best of luck to you Rachel. Don't be a stranger."

ooOO0OOoo

The whole encounter with the happy werewolf couple… had been nice. And odd. But also nice. And in some ways unsettling. Then again, things that changed one's routine unexpectedly were always at least a slight bit unsettling. Huh. The whole "actually liking these people" thing was very much a dimension of things I hadn't considered before. New variables would need to be factored into the decision making process after they had been properly evaluated and categorized.

Well… whatever. That was a concern that could be put off for another day. Now that I was alone and with a handful of pamphlets burning a hole in my satchel an idea got firmly lodged in my head. An idea that just wouldn't go away, though granted I didn't try very hard to make it do so.

For various reasons I'd been putting it off for a couple of months now. But now I found myself suddenly very much determined to put that streak to an end.

Come hell or high water, I was going to do some bloody magic.

I ended up wandering far from where I left Fred, going off the beaten path until I found a hidden little copse of trees behind one of the large, Gothic buildings that made up the University. Feeling excitement bubbling up within me I plopped myself down under a tree and eagerly fished out Dresden's little pamphlets. Time to see if there was anything in them that I could use.

There were three pamphlets in all. Their contents turned out to be… to put it mildly… _extremely_ disappointing.

The first one I picked up was all about the Laws of Magic. Extremely important stuff… had I not known about them ahead of time. It could harm you, it could corrupt you, extremely dangerous, yadda yadda yadda. No mention of men in grey cloaks coming to chop your head off through. I'm thinking that would have been a better deterrent than vague-ish warnings about how these certain acts could "irreversibly corrupt your mind and your spirit". Oh well.

I chucked that one in my bag and pulled out the next one.

This one was even more useless to me. It answered questions such as "what is a Wizard?" "what is Magic?" "who can do Magic?" "how do I know if I can really do Magic?" Honestly the books had covered all that information and more in much more exhausting and exacting detail. With a frustrated sigh I stuffed that one back in my bag with very understandable levels of violence before pulling out the third and final pamphlet.

This one was… _slightly_ more useful, in that it wasn't completely worthless. It basically gave an overview of how wizards did some of their magic, while not giving enough details to actually _do_ any of it yourself. Things such as the phenomenon of contagion, which was the principle by which Thaumaturgy was able to function. Very briefly importance of someone's Name, the importance of symbols, what a focus was… just general useful information on a variety of topics that would fit in a paragraph or two. Again not really anything I didn't already know. But it did give me an idea of where I could start.

One of the things the last pamphlet mentioned was magic circles. That got me thinking. Circles were pretty much the most standard, most basic way to cast a spell weren't they? You make a circle, close it with a bit of magic, feed intent and energy into the circle, release the energy in the circle, the accumulated energy does what you intended. Boom, Spells for Dummies 101. Simple in theory. There were probably endless volumes out there that elaborated on that simple premise but… the basic structure should remain the same pretty much no matter what.

So. First step then. Make a circle. How was I going to do that?

From what I remembered circles, physical circles, were more of a symbolic aid or tool (or crutch) so you wouldn't have to hold the image in your mind, complicating your casting further. So it didn't really matter how the circle was made as long as it could act as an anchor point for your intent. So. It didn't really matter much how I made a circle now did it?

My hands shaking slightly from nerves and excitement I start to pluck away at the strands of grass on the ground in front of me, pulling them up by their roots. It took me a few minutes to create a mostly round circle about two feet across in front of me. Sure, it was somewhat messy and crude and not even close to a mathematically perfect circle, but from what I understood it should still work just fine.

So. The circle was done. Now I just needed to… put and bit of magic into it and it would snap shut. Simple. Easy. Couldn't get more basic than that.

I might have had to climb the building I was next to and throw myself off of I couldn't pull this off.

Right… magic. Magic. Magic. I… _could_ feel the energy I thought was my magic. It felt sort of like… water inside my body almost. Underneath my skin. And outside of me too. Flowing, moving, churning, stagnating, all sorts of things. I'd been too paranoid to try messing with it before. Now however… now I was still somewhat nervous but after my time spent talking to Billy and Georgia I was much more willing to take the leap and do something with it.

Right. Well, magic could be guided by visualizations. Why not try that?

In my mind I pictured my magic rising up from wherever it resided inside of me. I pictured my magic pooling in my chest before starting to flow down my right arm. As I reached out and touched the edge of the circle I pictured my magic as a blue wispy light moving along my limb to my fingertips. When I felt a great deal of… _water_ or _pressure_ going all the way to very tips of my digits I pictured my blue wispy magic flowing out of my fingers to fill the ring of the circle I had created.

It genuinely surprised me when I felt something _–_ _snap-_ shut. I jerked my hand back and blinked. Somehow I _knew_ … I could sense the circle that I had just created. It was hard to describe. To use an old cliché, it would be like trying to explain color to someone blind from birth. It is enough to say that I could definitely, unambiguously feel it. And there was only one word in my mind to describe what I was experiencing.

 _Whoa._

My lips stretched into a wide grin and I started laughing… laughing so hard that anyone walking by might have had some serious questions and concerns about my sanity. Still in that moment that was the furthest thing from my mind. My laughter was joy, disbelief and just a little bit of hysteria. Somehow making a simple magic circle just… _nuked_ any lingering doubts I might have had left about magic being real. Not that there had been many. But there had been a few. Now however in that moment… yeah, those doubts were deader than disco.

Eventually I calmed down enough to sit back up, my mind racing with possibilities. I wasn't going to stop there. _Hell_ no I wasn't going to stop there. Still feeling giddy I tried to think of what sort of spell I wanted to try to cast now that I had a real honest-to-God magic circle. A tracking spell? A scrying spell? Make a fire? Take an item and try to make it more durable?

As my mind flooded with possibilities something occurred to me. Some wizards in the series had certain magical disciplines they were naturally good at. If I remembered correctly often what they were naturally good at would manifest early on as their "accidental magic". Molly had used a veil the first time she did magic. Dresden had used… force when he was doing a long jump to propel himself further? I wasn't sure if that counted as a "Forzare" precursor but he sure as hell became very good at projecting force later on.

What had been my first instance of magic?

Turning perfectly good milk into curdled milk.

Milk turns into curdled milk thanks to bacteria.

There was also a good deal more along those lines.

There was that houseplant that I had been focused on while I was upset. It grew rapidly over the course of a day before dying. There were a few instances of prematurely spoiled food. In one particularly unpleasant occasion my shower became completely covered in black mold overnight.

So did that mean I had a particular gift for… manipulating biology? Manipulating life? Something like that. It sounded like a decent bet.

There was also the dead squirrel. Somehow that always stood out in mind because of how bizarre it was. Was that also some kind of accidental life magic? Or had it been…?

 _Accidental necromancy…?_

The thought that it might have been that didn't bother me all that much to be honest. Or I should say, it only bothered me to the extent that it might get me my head chopped off. On the balance it was probably better if I didn't have some kind of affinity for the dead.

It had most likely been some kind of life-related magic. Probably.

Still maybe I should start keeping that story to myself.

Well, whatever. Another problem to contemplate later. It's not like I was going to be running into any White Council goons anytime soon.

So… magic circle. Possible affinity to affecting biology with my magic. So what was I going to do?

The answer was glaringly obvious once I realized it. Inside the circle I'd made on the ground there was already a good deal of grass. Convenient. I had an idea that if what I was trying to affect was already in the circle to begin with then whatever magic I was trying to work would go so much easier.

Affect the grass. Okay. The idea that immediately came to mind was to make the grass fuzzy. Sort of like a dandelion. I debated it for a few moments before shrugging. Sure, why not? It was just as good for a first try as anything else.

This time there was a lot less hesitation as I tapped into my magic. Being a Buddhist had its benefits, since being a Buddhist and _not_ meditating at least semi-regularly was sort of ridiculous (even if there were most likely plenty of people who did just that). Point was that I was already somewhat trained in how to focus my mind. Without that previous training what I tried to do then would most likely have been impossible.

I fixed the image of what I wanted firmly in my mind. I pictured grass with thin, quarter inch white fuzz growing all over it. It took me about ten minutes of intense concentration before I was certain that the image had stabilized in my mind… a far more challenging task than most people realize. Once I was secure in the image I let my fingers slide to the edge of the circle.

What came next was a mental juggling act, holding the image of what I wanted, what I _intended_ , while at the same time visualizing my magic rising up from within me and traveling into the circle. I'm not sure how long I held the image and pumped my magic into the circle exactly. Past a certain point concentration really can lead to a complete loss of the awareness of time. However I could feel the circle gradually "filling up" as I poured more and more of myself into it. It was simultaneously one of the most difficult and most thrilling things I had ever done in my entire life.

After a while I felt my reserves of magic begin to wane and falter, and exhaustion began to become a real concern. Since I had no idea how much magic my "spell" would need I just kept going until I just couldn't continue focusing properly. Before distraction made a mess of things I pulled back, "disconnecting" myself from the circle before I could begin to corrupt it.

I felt really tired from the effort, yeah, but I also was impatient to see the results. Without pausing to take a breather and reached down and broke the circle. There was a rush almost like displaced air as the trapped magic escaped and went out to do its work.

For a few long moments my stomach sank as nothing happened. I was already starting to think about where I might have gone wrong when the spell started to take effect. The results were… not what I had expected.

In a sense my spell _did_ work. I watched with wide eyed wonder as all the blades of grass within the circle suddenly started to grow a short white fuzz at an incredible rate. In less than twenty seconds all the grass looked almost like it was covered in a thin carpet of snow.

That was all well and good… except for where the mass for the white fuzz came from.

The blades of grass, every single one of them that grew that fuzz, had turned into a mutilated wreck. The spell seemed to have taken mass randomly from different parts of the blades of grass to create the new growths. Some had holes in them. Others collapsed under their own weight as their support structure was cannibalized. A few had been completely separated from their roots. Most of them however just had dozens if not hundreds of tiny slits and perforations in them, so much so that they almost certainly would not survive.

I was a little bit horrified, but for the most part just fascinated really, with what I had done. It was _really, really_ fascinating to be perfectly frank. First of all, no matter the result I had done magic. Rather than dwell on that though my mind seemed to jump ahead all on its own to how to refine and perfect the process.

Already I had literally dozens of ideas coming to me as to what I could try next. Thank goodness I hadn't tried this on an animal first though. I mean _duh_ , where did I think the mass was going to come from? Of course something like this would happen. No ectoplasm here… could I somehow use ectoplasm? How would that even work? If the grass was submerged in a nutrient vat would the spell have used that instead? What about shaping the spell so that half the grass would have cannibalized their neighbors for the required biomass? Would _that_ have worked? And what principles might I be able to uncover from these experiments?

What else would I be able to do, in time? Custom made designer plants? Could I regrow missing limbs? Could I mold and reshape my body to look like anything I wanted? _What else could I do with magic that had nothing to do with the spell I had just cast?_

Literally in a span of minutes an entire new universe of possibilities opened up before me. And it was _glorious_.

I'm not sure how long I sat there, giddy and lost in thought. I was so engrossed in my musing and theorizing that I didn't even notice a person approaching until he was literally five feet in front of me. The sudden appearance of a stranger startled me and I may or may not have jumped and screamed… a _little bit_ … when the newcomer cleared his throat loudly to get my attention.

I was on my feet in a second, my heart feeling like it wanted to beat its way out of my chest. "Don't _sneak up_ on people like that!" I yelled at the newcomer, half because I was angry and half because he'd scared me.

Now that I was on my feet I got to get a good look at him. My first uncharitable thought was that he belonged on the Texas border with Mexico. I say that because my first impression was that they guy in front of me was very much a Mexican with that sort of Danny Trejo look to him… if somewhat less intimidating than old _Machete_. This impression was further reinforced by the Western shirt and bolo tie he was wearing. He had long grey hair and looked to be… well, I wasn't sure exactly, but he certainly was starting to get up there in years.

The man smiled at me, his expression both amused and apologetic. He held his hands up in a peaceable gesture and took a small step back. "I didn't mean to frighten you. I tried making plenty of noise as I walked up. You must have been having some very deep thoughts to get lost in them so."

I frowned at the man. He had an accent, but it definitely wasn't a Spanish accent. Probably not a Mexican then. I crossed my arms and frowned at him. "Did you want something, sir? I was kind of in the middle of something." My tone left no doubt as to how very _pleased_ I was with being interrupted by some random stranger. Not to mention that suddenly finding myself out of sight of any of the main thoroughfares with some strange man was putting me on edge.

The man ignored my hostile tone, instead putting his arms behind his back and looking down at the results of my spell. "You're new to this I take it?" he asked pleasantly as his eyes critically examined my handiwork.

Alarms bells started to go off in my head. "My first time. What is it to you?"

The man frowned, looking up from the fuzzy circle straight at me. "Really? Your first spell? By yourself?"

 _What the fuck?_ Who the hell was this guy? My hackles went up. It had to be someone who was _in the know_ , that much was clear. "I said," my tone biting, "What. Is. It. To. You?"

The man sighed, and suddenly he looked rather tired as he ran a hand through his hair. He turned his gaze on me, and there was something like pity or maybe sympathy in his eyes. "People used to be more trusting you know," he began. "There also used to be fewer of them. Both those factors used to make this kind of thing easier. I was nearby and I sensed what you were doing. My only thought as I came over was to help, I assure you."

Though his manner and what he said didn't exactly put me at ease… something about him just took the edge off my hostility. "Help me with what?" I asked warily.

Instead of answering he held his hand low, like he was beckoning for something to come. Before I could wonder the gesture a young raccoon scurried down from a tree next to him. It hit the ground running and jumped on his arm, scrambling up his shirt sleeve to sit on his shoulder. The sight tickled something in my memory before it hit me. My eyes widened to the size of saucers.

 _No. No fucking way._

"Tell me Miss," the man said as he reached up to scratch the young raccoon's chin, "have you ever heard of the Seven Laws of Magic?"

 _Not Mexican. Native American. Old, Native American guy, in the know, in Chicago around when the Council is supposed to meet in town, has a young raccoon with him as a companion._

"Does," I began haltingly, staring at the man in front of me and at the animal sitting on his shoulder with a metric ton of incredulity and disbelief. "Does your… ugh… pet have a name?"

The man smiled at me, seemingly pleased that I would ask after his companion.

"He is not my pet. He is my friend. His name is Little Brother. As for me, you can call me Joe."

-


	6. Capitolo Sei - All The Difference

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Sei.**

ooOO0OOoo

My mouth started working more on less on automatic as my brain struggled to deal with the improbability that had just appeared before me. "Pleasure to meet you Mr. Joe. And…" I hesitated, turning my gaze to the raccoon that was sort-of glancing in my direction as he basked with half-lidded eyes at the chin scratching he was receiving. "… Little Brother."

Joe-bloody-Listens-to-Wind (because who else could it be at this point, really?) waved off my formality with good humor. "Just Joe, please. Whenever possible it prefer to keep things casual. It makes for a much more relaxing atmosphere, wouldn't you agree?"

No, I actually didn't. Formality was another wall that I could hide behind when I didn't really want to interact with people on a personal level. It also tended to set up an easy playbook of rules which were generally easy to navigate and to work to my advantage if need be. But I wasn't about to start contradicting someone who sat on the Senior Council and was probably one of the seven strongest and most skilled wizards on the planet.

"Okay… ugh… Joe," I said before wincing. Yeah. That hadn't been awkward at all.

"So what is your name young lady? If you don't mind me asking," he asked good naturedly.

"Rachel," I said haltingly, shuffling my feet nervously and adverting my gaze. Damn it. Why did I always get like this?

Joe once again smiled at me before his expression dimmed to something more serious. "So Rachel, I ask you once again: have you heard of the Seven Laws of Magic?"

Of course I had. I knew them quite well in fact. However would it be a problem admitting I knew them? How would I explain it?

The obvious answer came to me when I remembered the pamphlets that Dresden had made. I reached into my satchel and pulled out the brochure explaining the Seven Laws. Hesitantly I stepped a little closer and held out the pamphlet to Joe. He reached out and took it with a questioning look.

"What's this?"

"The Seven Laws," I said shrugging one shoulder. "Read about them for the first time just a bit ago actually."

Joe raised an eyebrow and began reading through the pamphlet, Little Brother looking over his shoulder as if he could somehow understand what was written as well. Thinking about it, I really had no idea if the little raccoon could somehow actually read. He did belong to a wizard after all and magic was bullshit.

"This is most informative," Joe said, half to himself as he finished looking though the document. "Where did you get this?"

I shrugged again. "A man named Harry Dresden makes them."

Joe's eyes turned from the pamphlet and looked at me sharply. I'll admit that I swallowed nervously and took a half step back at the sudden shift in his intensity. He wasn't exactly wary per se but certainly much more alert. "You know Dresden?"

I suddenly felt put on the spot, but I didn't see any reason to lie. Besides doing something like that might come back to bite me in the butt later. "When weird… stuff started happening around me he's the only one I found who might be able to help. Calls himself a wizard, everyone says he's the real deal. I haven't met him yet but one of his friends got me some of these pamphlets he's put out. I'm hoping that he'll be able to help me learn how to control and use these… gifts… I seem to have," I said, nodding at the circle of magically altered grass on the ground.

Joe didn't say anything. Instead he just scrutinized me, his expression a mix of both displeasure and concern. I began to fidget after a few moments under his scrutiny and couldn't help but wonder if he'd even met Dresden yet. The first time they'd officially met was during the big White Council meeting in Chicago if I remembered correctly. And that… was around the time of Summer Knight, which should be sometime around right now. That might actually explain a few things.

I only lasted another moment before I tried to relieve the discomfort I was feeling under his scrutiny by trying to change the subject. I cleared my throat awkwardly and went with the first questions that came to mind. "Are you a wizard too? And what were you doing around here anyway?"

Thankfully that seemed to snap him out of his evaluation of me and he once again gave me a friendly and amicable smile. "Yes, I am most certainly a wizard. As to what I was doing here, well I was visiting some old acquaintances of mine when I felt your working out here," he said, nodding his head towards the large building I had chosen to hide behind.

I puzzled that tidbit of information out, bringing a map of the campus that I'd seen to mind to figure out exactly where I'd ended up. "The medical school?" I asked a little incredulously after realizing just what building I'd been behind to the entire time.

Joe nodded at that, turning to look at the building. "Yes. I graduated from here some oh… forty years or so ago. Some of the professors I had at the time are still teaching believe it not. I'm so rarely around these parts I thought I would take the time to tread the old grounds while I still had the opportunity." He paused for a thoughtful moment, his expression darkening a bit. "I was actually considering going back. Circumstances however will force me to delay such luxuries for some time I'm afraid."

 _Circumstances?_ I wasn't sure what he meant for a second before it hit me. The war with the Red Court had started the year before and was just getting into full swing now wasn't it? Oh crap. If everything was like I remembered then the Reds had just recently wiped out Archangel, killing Simon Pietrovich of the Senior Council along with his entire household. That is what had created the opening for Ebenezar McCoy to get a seat on the Council. I felt a sudden chill pass through me. If even someone like Simon Pietrovich, Senior Council member, leading world authority on vampires, and wizard with centuries of experience who lived in a literal fortress could just be taken out by the bad things in this world when he made himself an inconvenience… what chance did someone like me have?

Absolutely zero, that's what.

A startling realization hit me. If I even wanted to _survive_ in this world I was either going to need some very powerful allies or I was going to have to stay so far under the radar that I'd probably need to start living at the bottom of Lake Michigan. Associating with Dresden or even just living in Chicago wouldn't be conducive to that second goal _at all_.

Maybe... maybe I should stay away from Chicago, stay in Ohio maybe. Just staying away from all of that insanity should keep me safe, right? No need to jump head first into danger like an idiotic lemming MC from some shitty Shonen manga after all.

… of course that would only keep me "safe" until the Reds bought the farm and the Fomor suddenly and inexplicably popped up _everywhere_ and started abducting even small-time practitioners left and right. That was another angle I hadn't even considered. With me having a full blown talent I'd probably draw those slimy fishy salty emo rejects to me like chum draws carnivores in the water.

Not to mention whatever other supernatural predators out there a talent like mine might begin to attract.

If I even wanted to have a chance to _survive_ in this world I was going to have to learn how to defend myself. That meant things just went from "I really want a teacher" to "I _need_ a teacher and the protection that brings."

But if that teacher was anyone from the White Council that meant that sooner or later I would be expected to be on the front lines fighting the Reds. The war was supposed to go on for at least another eight or nine years. I'd definitely be competent enough to throw at the front lines by then.

Shit. Shit. **Shit!**

I didn't want to fight the Reds. I wanted absolutely nothing to do with that!

"Are you alright, young lady?" Joe asked me, a touch of concern in his voice. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

I jumped a little as his voice jolted me out of my reverie. Right. Senior Council member. Probably not a good time for me to get lost in thought or to start having panic attack.

"Y-yes, I'm fine," I blurted out a little too quickly before thinking up of an excuse on the spot. "Just… starting to realize I might really be in over my head with all this magic stuff."

Joe nodded, seeming to accept my explanation in stride. "I know many people in the magic community all across the world, Miss. Many wizards I know of would jump at the chance to have you as an apprentice."

My eyes widened in surprise. That was a very sudden and very unexpected pivot in our conversation. I was starting to feel like I was getting _way_ too many surprises in one day. "What? Really? _Why_?" I asked. I couldn't help but sound a little suspicious even though I didn't really want to.

Joe shrugged. "For you to be able to do what you did with that spell on your first try and with no training strongly suggests you have an affinity for either Transmogrification or Biomancy, or both. Both are rare and valued talents if used responsibly. The scale of what you just managed to do also tells me that you probably have a good deal of raw power as well. Both of those things combined would get a lot of wizards interested in taking you as an apprentice. It would be irresponsible of me not to offer you guidance when I can."

I thought about it for a few long minutes, Joe giving me the space I needed to contemplate his sudden and unexpected offer. The offer was… tempting. Unless I wanted to strike a deal with some faction _other_ than the White Council, which I couldn't think of how to do in a way that would even remotely end well for me, one way or the other I was going to need a wizard mentor.

What Joe hadn't mentioned was that I would most likely have to move to wherever this potential mentor lived in order to train with them. But assuming they lived in the US or Canada or maybe even the UK that could be a good thing. I could get into a college nearby (assuming they didn't live in a cave or a mountaintop), study magic on the side and live more or less a normal life. I'd potentially eventually have the White Council pressuring me or trying to outright force me into the Wardens to fight the Reds, yes, but something like that would be years away and I figured I could eventually cross that bridge when I came to it. More importantly I'd stay far away from Chicago and all the crazy danger that city was going to attract in the coming years.

However…

I rubbed my temples and closed my eyes as I felt a tension headache coming on. However… if things played out like I remembered, a lot of people were going to die in the coming years. People that didn't deserve it. People like Shiro next year, a man who had been so selfless and self-sacrificing he had been practically… maybe even literally… a Saint. He would die in horrible pain being tortured by a monster... if everything proceeded as I remembered it. In fact I suspected there were better than even odds of it still happening the way I remembered if I ran away and didn't do a single thing about it.

And as heavy and depressing as it was to think about Shiro was only the tip of the iceberg.

I was no hero. I had absolutely zero interest in fighting "bad guys" or getting into life-or-death situations. I also had a strong aversion to getting involved in things that really weren't my business. Why would I want to saddle myself with more worries and drama? I already had enough things I wanted to do with my time, thank-you-very-much. However just turning tail and letting a bunch of people be torn apart by monsters without even lifting a single finger to do anything about it…

… I couldn't bring myself to do it. Even if part of me really wished I could be that selfish.

I let out a deep sigh and opened my eyes to look at Joe, hoping I didn't look as weary as I felt. "It's really tempting Mr. Joe, assuming everything you're saying is actually on the up-and-up, but unless they live in or near Chicago I'm afraid I can't. I'm going to be attending the University you see. So unless you know someone who might want to teach me by correspondence or might want to come up with some sort of alternative arrangement… I might just have to take my chances with Harry Dresden and see if he will teach me anything."

By his expression I could tell Joe wasn't particularly pleased by my response but I could also tell that it wasn't completely unexpected either. With some reluctance he nodded his acknowledgement. "I see. That is unfortunate but I can certainly understand your reluctance, young Miss. However seeing that you are trained is still of the utmost importance I feel. I'll talk to some people. Most wizards would balk at having anything other than a traditional apprentice but maybe a few will be interested."

I bit my lip and nodded a little jerkily. "Thank you, sir."

Joe's expression once again broke into a wide smile. "What did I say? None of that 'sir' business. Just Joe. Tell me Rachel, what languages do you speak? Many of my Wizard friends are foreign you see. It would help our chances considerably if you spoke more than just English."

Despite feeling somewhat subdued given what I had recently just realized and the sheer insanity of my spur of the moment decision to remain in Chicago I couldn't help but grin a little at Joe's question. Have I mentioned yet that I am incredibly, incredibly smart? Well in addition to that I was also gifted. Amazingly gifted. More specifically, I'd discovered early on that I was an incredibly gifted polyglot. Languages were my bitch.

"I speak English, Italian, Spanish, French, and Portuguese. My German and Russian are passable. I can also read and write Sanskrit and Tibetan, and can muddle through a conversation in the latter though I still need a lot of practice. I was also thinking of either picking up Mandarin or Japanese too before this whole magic business starting taking up pretty much all of my attention."

I had to resist the childish impulse to fist pump when Joe-fucking-Listens-To-Wind looked surprised and impressed.

"An impressive list," Joe commented. "Most young people don't have an interest in languages these days."

"Meh, romance languages are more or less all practically the same anyway," I said with modesty. Or attempted modesty at any rate. I wasn't very good at it. By Joe's bemused expression he noticed that, too.

Oh well.

"Why Tibetan though? Seems an odd choice," he asked. For some reason he seemed really interested in that point.

"I converted to Tibetan Buddhism," I said, this time with some actual, _genuine_ modesty. There weren't a whole lot of groups of people I respected. The genuine holders of the Buddha-Dharma that hailed from Tibet were one of them. "I figured it was worth it to learn the language and to be able to read the texts in the original without having to rely on translations."

Joe nodded his head, looking thoughtful. "Tibetan Buddhists have powerful wizards. They tend to be eccentric and more often than not walk to the beat of their own drummer… even more so than the average wizard. I'll have to write a few letters."

Before I could fully let his statement sink in Joe produced a business card from somewhere and held it out to me. After a moment's hesitation I reached out and took it. Looking at it the only thing that was written on it was a P.O. Box address in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan.

"Now I really must go. I'm already running late for an important meeting," he said with a smile, and to my surprise it really looked like he regretted having to leave. "Rachel, your gift is just that, a most wonderful _gift_ , but it can also be very dangerous. To keep yourself safe you will need training. Write to me with a return address and though it might be a few months I will write back to you with some good news."

It struck me that he said he _will_ write back with good news. He said it with such confidence that I couldn't help but believe him. Did that mean he was confident he could find me a part time mentor of some kind…?

Before I could dwell on it anymore he continued, his tone turning more serious. In fact he suddenly sounded so dead serious that it freaked me out a little bit. The intensity and sheer weight of _age_ and experience in his eyes left me feeling more than a little bit small and unnerved.

"Keep to the Seven Laws. I cannot stress this enough. Do not make me come looking for you."

Suddenly my throat felt constricted, my mouth going dry and words failing me as Joe stared me down. His gaze suddenly felt like a real, physical weight against all of my being. Never in two lives had I ever felt so completely and utterly intimidated by another human being. In that moment, there was not even a single speck of doubt in my mind that if he wanted to he could utterly unmake everything that I was and there was absolutely nothing that I could do to stop him. I couldn't do anything but nod jerkily, an irrational (or perhaps very rational) stab of fear freezing my insides cold. When he finally seemed convinced that I really understood how serious he was the oppressive feeling let up, causing me to take a deep breath as I suddenly felt like I could finally breathe again.

I blinked, and suddenly Joe once again only looked like a friendly old man in a Western shirt with a bolo tie and a little raccoon hanging off his shoulder. Manjushri and Chenrezig, what the _hell_? I couldn't help but look at him a great deal more warily now. Whatever he had done… I realized one very important fact.

Joe Listens-to-Wind was one _scary_ motherfucker.

With a smile and a tip of an imaginary, nonexistent hat Joe said "goodbye Miss Rachel" as casual as you like and began to walk away. I could do nothing but stand there and look after him, frozen with by brain stuck in thanks to… just… well, _everything_ that had just happened in the last few minutes. Joe was about ten feet away when he stopped and turned back to me, adding one more sage piece of advice almost as an afterthought.

"By the way Rachel, be careful of Dresden. While I don't doubt that his intentions are largely good the community as a whole thinks very poorly of him. He's seen as a maverick. A loose cannon that is potentially unstable. Some people also have some serious concerns about his character. He's a dangerous man, young Miss. I'd hate to see you painted with the same brush simply by association."

Leaving me with that upbeat and thoroughly reassuring warning he left, leaving me there alone with my churning and troubled thoughts. Damn. What the hell. I closed my eyes and took a deep, shaky breath.

So, to summarize: Not even a full day into officially doing this magic business and already a member of the Senior Council had more-or-less threatened to hunt me down personally if I broke any of the Seven Laws of Magic.

I'd more or less impulsively turned down a cushy apprenticeship somewhere safe in order to stay in a city that would pretty soon be giving Naoko Takeuchi's Azabu-Juban and the Hellmouth a run for their money as the world's premier hub for the motherfucking apocalypse.

And I'd _also_ had the horrible epiphany that my life from now on would almost certainly be filled with extremely powerful things that wanted to kill me and/or enslave me and that there was absolutely nothing I could do about that fact. Except hide behind people who were much more powerful and experienced than me. At least until I learned how to fight back.

I really didn't like fighting.

… At all.

Being a short petite girl with sticks for arms who weighed just a tiny bit over a hundred pounds would do that to you.

Honestly… could this day _possibly_ get any worse?

"Ms. Bicchielli," an irritated voice behind me practically growled.

Slowly I turned around. Huh. Would you look at that.

"Hi Fred," I said with a little wave.

He glowered.

Then I remembered… I still had dinner with Johnny Marcone that evening.

It was too much.

I fell to my knees and started crying.

I'd never seen a man look so anxious and apologetic in my entire life.

… It was sort of hilarious.


	7. Capitolo Sette - Amore Paterno

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Sette.**

ooOO0OOoo

Despite having made a split-second decision to do something as stupid as willingly move to Chicago in case I could use my maybe-good-maybe-not future knowledge to maybe make things a little better, that did not mean I was not afraid.

I was deathly afraid.

However, in spite of that, I can honestly say that death itself did not scare me all that much anymore. I'd died once already and had eventually gotten better, more or less. Perhaps reincarnating with all my memories intact was a one time fluke but it did serve to take the mystery out of the whole process for me. In the end, it was no doubt that I had the unfair advantage of having little uncertainty about death.

Pain, however. I was scared of pain. People who died by supernatural threats in the Dresden Files did not tend to die well, or easy. Not to mention the torture. There was a lot of torture in the Dresden Files. It was kind of a hobby for a lot of supernatural beings. Also, I can honestly say I was pants-wettingly terrified of having my free will ripped away from me. Ending up the lackey of some evil fairy or some other nasty creature without any sort of recourse was a real possibility. Dying would be a much better option. But if I ended up in that position of servitude, however, my own death might well suddenly not even be possible for me to carry out of my own free will.

Death, though. I could handle death. Having died once I felt an intimacy with the concept that I doubted anyone else shared. It was a bizarre twist my life had taken when I found myself wishing that if things went horribly wrong, may I please just have a quick death with no drawn out shenanigans, thank you very much.

So why was I willingly going headfirst into all of this again?

… Yes, that's right, because as a full blown talent I'd be found eventually and people and things would attempt to prey on me no matter what. So I had to get involved with the supernatural if only for my protection. It was a matter of _survival_. Sooner or later I'd be found if I simply tried to hide. The minute my powers began to awaken any hope of a normal life was over, dramatic and whiny as that sounded.

Well. On the flip side I'd now be learning to harness the phenomenal cosmic power of the universe, so... yay me?

To be honest, I wasn't feeling anything close to steely resolve at the time. If anything I was riddled with doubt and apprehension. But running away didn't feel right either. I could have taken Joe Listens-to-Wind up on his offer and found an apprenticeship far from Chicago. But I didn't. Too much of a conscience. Too much reading about Bodhisattvas since I had converted to Buddhism. How many people had died in between _Summer Knight_ and _Skin Game_? How much pain had been inflicted? How many tortured? Too many, far too many for me to simply just simply blow off and ignore.

However... that did not mean I felt brave. In fact at the time I was extremely averse to danger. And Harry didn't really need any more muscle anyway as I saw it. Maybe... I could help out just by giving a critical hint or two, at the right time. Some occasional help to nudge him in the right direction. Help him and others avoid some unnecessary pain and suffering, and maybe save a few lives in the process. Then, with my wisdom dispensed, I would just run away and sit tight somewhere behind thick wards, thicker walls and mountains of defensive enchantments and ride out the yearly craziness. No need to get directly involved, right?

It was a good plan at the time, I'd thought. Sensible. Workable. No dramatic heroics. I'd stay far away from any fighting and maybe play Oracle to Dresden's Batman, or something along those lines.

Oh sweet summer child. How naive I had been in those early, early days.

ooOO0OOoo

Johnny Marcone took me to the best and most exclusive steakhouse in Chicago, and all I had to wear for the occasion were black jeans, converse shoes and the finest of pullovers from Walmart.

I was embarrassed and self conscious getting out of the backseat of the car, catching a glimpse of women in dresses and jewels that certainly cost more than my whole wardrobe and impeccably dressed men in suit jackets as somebody opened the pair of double doors and went into the restaurant. _Chicago Cut Steakhouse,_ apparently something of a staple spot for the who's-who of Chicago high society. The host standing by the entrance caught a glimpse of my attire and couldn't help but sneer in distaste at my outfit before the door swung shut. Lovely.

I was torn away from my brooding when a large hand settled gently on my shoulder, causing me to jump just a _little tiny_ bit out of my skin in surprise. The hand retracted promptly, and in that moment I was relieved to learn that the person it belonged to at the very least had no issues with taking a hint. I turned my head to look up at Johnny Marcone who had walked up to stand next to me when I hadn't been looking. I'm not sure why I did it, maybe out of politeness or self preservation, but I gave him a small ( _a bit shy_ ) smile to reassure him I wasn't offended. And I wasn't, really. A bit uncomfortable, yes, but not as much as I probably should have been. For all of his violent reputation Marcone had done a scarily good job of getting me to start relaxing around him on the car ride over to the restaurant. Who knew that the crime boss of Chicago would be so good at telling funny and interesting stories about life in the Windy City?

"You'll love this place. Best meat for five hundred miles. Come on," he said to me with a tilt of his head and a roguish smile. My return smile was somewhat uncertain but he didn't let that deter him. With confidence and aplomb he gently guided me into the restaurant, and I didn't have much choice but to follow along.

The impeccably dressed host on the other side of the door turned up his nose when he saw me come in and practically sneered at me Severus Snape style (he even had the same nose) until he saw who walked in right behind me. His spit-take and the sudden widening of his eyes was hilarious, and I couldn't help but grin cheekily at the poor befuddled host as the current don of all Chicago loomed like a silent shadow behind me.

"The girl is a dear family friend," said Johnny as he stepped past me and addressed the host directly. "I would appreciate a private table where we would not be disturbed."

It was clear the host knew perfectly well who Johnny Marcone was, because after visibly taking a second to regain his composure the man scrambled to obey without a word about my inappropriate attire. I snuck a glance at my "family friend". He was trying so hard to be friendly and charming with me and I just... I just couldn't see the man that had an iron grip on the Chicago underworld. I was trying, but it was hard to see the ruthless criminal, the man who probably had been directly or indirectly responsible for more deaths than I had years of life... even when you put the years of both of my lives together.

 _Yeah, probably should not think about that too much. Puking up the fancy food they serve in this place would be a total shame._

Feeling increasingly conflicted and unsure I followed as the host led us past the main dining room and further into the back of the restaurant. We ended up in a smaller, far more luxurious looking dining room where tables were tucked away in neat little corners, giving each of them a feeling of privacy and, dare I say it, quite ostentatious exclusivity. Two men in expensive looking suits looked up when we walked in and stared at us ( _me)_ in disbelief before quickly looking away and minding their own business. I flushed. Since Marcone was old enough to be my father, they had better not be thinking anything perverted.

"Sir, young Miss, if you will be seated your server Gerard will be with you right away."

After the host awkwardly "helped" me by pulling out my chair (awkward because no one had ever done that for me before and I just clumsily stumbled through it) I was left alone at a table with my mom's _old buddy_ Johnny Marcone. It was still kind of surreal. Was this a coincidence? It was just so bizarre. In fact the odds of this were so astronomical... I couldn't help but feel a little suspicious about the whole thing.

Marcone smiled at me. It was a warm, almost paternal smile. _He's a bad guy, remember?_ I looked away shyly, but even so I couldn't help the small smile that crawled its way onto my lips.

"So tell me," he asked me, for all the world looking extremely interested in what I had to say, "what did you think of the University of Chicago?"

I was hesitant at first, but Marcone was too damn good at this and with some gentle coaxing I was soon telling him about the school in a very animated fashion. For a time I rambled on about the architecture, the academics, how beautiful it was, the atmosphere, how I had already met some really nice and friendly students that somehow weren't mind numbingly boring or tedious (so far). It turned out that Marcone was a generous donor to the university and personally knew several people on its board of trustees, and soon I found myself listening to him with rapt attention as he shed light on some of the backroom deals and politics that went on at the school.

By the time the appetizers arrived I had pretty much forgotten to be wary of him. It was one thing to know in the abstract someone was a _bad man_ , but it was hard to stay on your guard when they were so friendly and personable and obviously trying to make a good impression. I'd never had much positive male attention in my life, unless you decided to count the occasional person trying to get in my pants. I knew in my head he was a _bad man_ , but I couldn't help but enjoy our interactions all the same.

It wasn't until the main course arrived ( _kobe beef and king crab legs, oh my god)_ that Marcone said something that brought my guard back up.

"You know Rachel, your mother and father were once my closest friends. In fact I still consider your mother a very dear friend. I've been very fortunate in life, and... well, I know that as much as she would love to, I know that Darla doesn't have the means to pay for your school, your expenses, housing, and all the other costs that come with living. I want to pay for your school, and to make sure that you don't want for anything while getting your education."

When I heard that I froze, a piece of crab leg sticking unflattering out of my mouth. I pulled it out of my mouth and chewed slowly on the deliciousness of the white meat to give myself time to think. Inside I was panicking just a little. This couldn't possibly be a good idea. Especially since Dresden, the man I was counting on to teach me magic, would probably flip the hell out if he found out Johnny Marcone was paying for me to go to school. Which... was a weird offer to begin with. Yes he'd been friends with my parents, I'd even gotten hints that maybe my dad had been involved with Marcone in the less legal side of things, but to go this far to help me? No. Something else was going on here that I wasn't seeing. I tried not to look at him suspiciously. Could he have figured out somehow that I was a potential wizard in the making? There was also the fact that it might be a bad idea to get painted with the same brush as Marcone if any of this came to light. Looking at him patiently waiting for my response, I swallowed and took a drink of my Coke to stall for a bit ore time. After a few moments I decided that he probably wasn't going to have me killed if I started addressing some of the elephants in the room.

"I'll admit that would be really... helpful," I conceded carefully. And it was true. We couldn't afford to pay for a school like U of C, let alone housing and all the other stuff. I'd have to wade deep into the pool of scholarships, grants and financial aid... and probably get a part time job to boot. Not ideal when I was also trying to learn magic in order to save my own hide. "However you have a certain, uh, reputation Mr. Marcone," I couldn't help but wince when I actually said it. "I'm not sure why you would want to do this. And besides that I'm not sure I'd be comfortable taking your money... you know, assuming all those rumors were true and stuff."

By this point I was kind of hunched in on myself, trying to make myself look as small as possible while covering half my face with my long dark hair. Okay, it was maybe a little cowardly, but I was actually scared. I didn't want to get him mad at me, and for more reasons than just the obvious. However peeking up at him through the curtain of my hair he didn't seem to be mad after what I'd said. If anything he seemed thoughtful as he looked at me with those eyes that were "green like worn dollar bills" as the books would say.

"I realize I do have a... reputation," he said carefully. "One for not always working inside the bounds of the law. Is that what you heard?"

Not trusting my voice, I just nodded my head shakily.

"Where did you hear that, if you don't mind me asking?"

I shrugged, still feeling incredibly tense and awkward. "The internet."

There was a brief pause before he spoke. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. By all accounts you're an incredibly smart girl, not at all oblivious like most of the youth noways." There was another brief pause before he continued. "I suppose I could sit here and deny all of it... but I won't." He said seriously.

"You won't?" I asked quizzically, some of my apprehension beginning to dissipate as he caught me off guard with his response.

"What did your mother tell you about my relationship with your father?" he asked me, looking more serious than I had ever seen him before.

"Umm, not much," I answered uncertainly. "Just that you were really good friends. Best friends, actually."

Marcone nodded at that, his eyes momentarily gaining a far off look before his gaze settled back on me. "That is correct. Angelo and I met back when we were just getting started. Back then the two of us were nothing more than cheap muscle trying to make a name for ourselves. Just a couple of stupid kids, really. We met on a job, when a shady club owner wanted some extra hands as insurance in case a deal went sour. There was a fight, chains and brass knuckles and a few knives. I saved Angelo from getting blindsided by a two-by-four. Afterwards, he bought me a beer. From that day on we stuck together, teaming up to do jobs together as often as we could."

In spite of myself, I found myself listening with rapt attention. One constant in both of my lives was that I'd been raised by a single mother. I'd never had a father. So when I got to hear a little bit about the one I could have had in this life had fate worked out a little different, I couldn't help but be enraptured. It also didn't hurt that this story involved a character like Johnny Marcone.

"He introduced me to your mother, and the three of us got on rather fabulously. Angelo and I officially joined the same outfit together about five years later. We had a few rough patches, but we were practically brothers by that point. Family. You understand?"

I bit my lip and nodded slowly even as a pit seemed to open up in my stomach. I had a feeling about where this might be going. This wasn't the sort of story that was going to end well.

I was right.

Marcone's countenance seemed to darken before he looked up and gave me a crooked smile. "I was actually there in the hospital when you were born, Rachel. Did you know that?"

I shook my head. No, I had most definitely not known that.

"Angelo had told me he'd been hoping for a boy... right up until he first laid eyes on you. Your father loved you more than anything else in the world. You should know that, Rachel. No man ever loved his kid more than Angelo did."

My throat felt tight, and before I knew it a single tear was streaming down my face, and then another. I hid my face and wiped my eyes furiously with my sleeve. Johnny was nice enough to pretend not to notice.

"Well...," continued Marcone, and for the first time he looked just a tad uncomfortable. "I won't go into details, but the long and short of it is that there was a shootout about a year and a half after you were born. It was an ambush. I took a bullet to the gut and went down early. Angelo... well, he saw me go down. He ran out of cover to drag my ass out of the fire. He pulled me to safety but in the process he'd been hit, too. I eventually recovered, but Angelo... he died a few days later in the hospital."

There was a heavy silence between us after that. His hands and demeanor were steady, but Marcone nonetheless took a deep pull from the drink he was having with dinner. For my part, I still had tears streaming down my face. I wasn't sure why. Its not like I'd ever met Angelo, mom had never talked about him much when I was growing up. I wasn't sure why this story was affecting me so much. But it did.

It slowly dawned on me as I looked at Marcone out of the corner of my eye that he felt guilt. Guilty over the death of his best friend, even all these years later. Or maybe it was regret. Or both. Or maybe even something else. Whatever the case though, it still affected him. However ruthless he was with his day job I couldn't help but feel sympathy for him. After all, I was feeling something similar myself, missing the presence of a man who was now fifteen years dead.

"Do... do you mind telling me more about dad?" I found myself asking in a small voice. "You know, not now, but... some other time?"

Slowly Marcone nodded. "Yes Rachel. It would be my honor."

We were silent for a few minutes after that, and it was... thoughtful. Comfortable, even. I absentmindedly ate a few more small bites while my mind wandered. Eventually, though, it was Marcone who broke the silence again.

"Rachel," he said, catching my eyes with his own. "Please allow me to pay for your education. Even if you do not want to go the University of Chicago, I still want to help. If you want I even have some contacts that could put in a good word for you if you wanted to get into Brown. Even Harvard, if you so desire. Helping you in any way I can is the least I can do for all the years of loyalty and friendship I have enjoyed from your father... from both of your parents. No strings attached."

"No strings?" I asked, not quite able to keep the hint of skepticism from my voice. "Really?"

"Well, if you're going to be staying in Chicago I would request that you join me for a meal occasionally. You'd also be more than welcome to come over any time and take advantage of the amenities my home has to offer," he said, once again with a winning smile. "But that is by no means a requisite. I only hope to get to know you a bit. After all, I consider you and Darla to be the closest things to family that I have left."

Well... shit.

On the one hand... Marcone was a criminal. Not just any criminal, but a ruthless crime boss. Who did... crime boss stuff. I'm sure it was very bad. However that didn't bother me so much as the other potential complications. That is, I didn't necessarily want to get painted with the same brush as Marcone. Especially by Harry Dresden. I could just imagine what would happen if he found out I'd taken Marcone up on his offer to come over and use his pool, not to mention taking money from him. Dresden _hated_ Marcone.

On the other hand... I was kind of scared shitless of the scary supernatural world I was walking into. Foremost on my mind was that I wanted to _survive_ with all of my toes, my free will and my sanity intact. On the simplest of levels, not having to worry about finances would free up my time to study things that would actually help me to stay alive. On a bigger picture level, Marcone was powerful. He had resources. He had a lot of resources. In a few years he would be a signatory of the Unseelie Accords, if everything went as expected. If things went pear-shaped Marcone could protect me. If I needed a magic tutor, Marcone could probably find one for me. His hiring Ms. Gard was proof enough of that.

There was also the... emotional side. The side that wanted that tenuous connection to my long deceased father. For someone who had never had a father, that was a powerful draw. Marcone said he thought of me almost as family. It... couldn't hurt to at least hear a little more about Angelo, could it?

Feeling almost queasy, I opened my mouth with what was the most important issue on my mind. "Even if I decide not to take you up on your offer... if I'm ever in big trouble... could I still maybe... come to you... for help?"

For a second Marcone's look turned sharp and speculative, and for a second I was certain I had just made a terrible mistake. But then that look turned to an easy smile that was nonetheless filled with silent promise. "My dear, you can always come to me with whatever problem you have. Whatever it is, I will use my considerable resources to help you as much as I can. Be it a flat tire, legal troubles, or even a pack of werewolves out to get you. You have my word."

It was quite unfortunate that I was drinking my Coke at the time, because the second the word "werewolves" came out of his mouth I choked on it violently, coughing and causing the carbonated drink to fly out of my nose. From then it all went downhill as I broke down into a massive coughing fit. A couple sitting several tables away turned in my direction just long enough to give me a dirty look.

"Are you quite all right, my dear?" asked Marcone, looking concerned but at the same time looking at me with a calculating gleam in his eye.

 _Does-does he know...?!_

"I-I'm good, t-thanks," I stuttered before quickly shoving a piece of steak in my mouth and then proceeding to look all around the room at anywhere but him.

 _Somehow, no matter what I decide to do from here,_ I thought with a sinking feeling, _I don't think I'll be getting Johnny Marcone completely out of my life any time soon.  
_  
Somehow, I found it even more distressing that I couldn't quite figure out if that was a good or a bad thing.


	8. Capitolo Otto - Rachel

ooOO0OOoo

 **Capitolo Otto.**

ooOO0OOoo

It was five months after my first visit to Chicago, now early November, when I finally returned to the city.

It's a small miracle my mother had allowed me to come this early instead of forcing me to wait until the start of the next semester in January to be perfectly honest. I think what finally convinced her were certain inconvenient side effects that began to crop up as part of my new magical "condition". In other words, just by existing I'd begun wrecking anything even remotely electric in the house. Parents may love their children, but that love may become a little more flexible if their children forced them to live without hot water or a refrigerator. I felt bad about inadvertently wrecking all the appliances and electronics, sure, but on the plus side Darla was now more or less giving me free reign to do whatever I needed to get a handle on this new problem... so long as I called her every single day and agreed to occasionally meet up with "uncle Johnny" so he could check up that I indeed had not been carried off by Venezuelan kidnappers looking to sell me off into the sex trade when no one was looking. Mom's words, not mine.

On the downside... well. There were more than enough of those to go around. Truthfully, I'd wanted to make some sort of principled, well-thought out decision from a detached clinical perspective as to whether or not I should take Marcone's money. Maybe if my new thing with frying of anything at all electronic ever wasn't so bad ( _I was still kind of traumatized and in denial to be honest)_ I could have had the luxury of turning down his help. As it stood however it would me impossible for me to live in a student dorm or an apartment, I probably wouldn't be able to hold down most jobs, and I likely was going to need all sorts of new and specialized items in the near future if I was going to have to live like a damn survivalist for the time being.

In the end, with apprehension and a guilty feeling in my gut I took "Uncle Johnny"'s money. Unless I wanted to beg Dresden to let me live in his basement with him I saw no other way. As a small silver lining at least I was pretty sure Marcone didn't know about my techno-pariah status as of yet. My mother had been surprisingly skittish when it came to picking up the phone and talking to Marcone, and Darla being who she was most likely wouldn't want to spread around that her daughter now had "special needs" (again her words, not mine), so I was pretty sure that she had kept quiet.

Still. I'd sort of resigned myself at this point that Marcone would figure out what I was, sooner or later. If he hadn't put it together already that is. The best I could do was prepare for when it happened and hope for the best.

Fuck my life.

That was a worry for future me though. Current me's priorities at the moment were more domestic and all pervading. That is, how being forced to go completely without electricity and electronics absolutely _**sucked**_. How the hell was I supposed to go to a modern university when I couldn't be around a computer for more than ten minutes at a time before it decided to self-destruct?

How the hell had Molly Carpenter lived in a normal home with her family while Dresden had to live without any modern conveniences anyway?

There had to be something I could do. Internet withdrawal was a real thing. But winter in the Midwest without hot water? Now that was a goddamn crime against humanity.

There was only one person I could reach out to in short order that could give me any sort of hope. To be honest I would have liked to have planned my approach better, paved the way beforehand with some phone calls, maybe even had Georgia and Billy properly introduce us if they were willing, but I was desperate. Mere hours after arriving in Chicago I hopped on a cab, and after rattling off the address I'd memorized months before from memory, I was off to the office of a certain magical private investigator.

In hindsight, our first meeting could have probably gone better.

ooOO0OOoo

 **Dresden Pov**

My name is Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. Though business had been good lately, no one ever tells you that even when private investigators are doing brisk business, there is always a considerable amount of downtime. It can't really be helped when even very involved cases tend to involve a lot of time just waiting around. Waiting for return phone calls. Staking out someone's house. Waiting until a potential person of interest is free from work so you can interview them. Sometimes even waiting for government buildings to open so you can sift through public records.

And that's just when you're on a case. Right now, in between cases, there really wasn't much to do except sit around my office during business hours waiting for the phone to ring. So over time I ended up keeping a lot of cheap paperbacks scatted all throughout my office. I'd read all of them at least twice. I couldn't really afford to be buying new ones constantly, but luckily I didn't really mind reading a good story over and over again. I was sitting on my desk with my feet kicked up, in the middle of what might have been my seventh re-read of _Rogue Squadron,_ when there came a hesitant knock at my door.

I looked up from my book, stretching out my magical senses out of habit. Normally it was hard to tell for sure who was a practitioner and who wasn't without skin to skin contact, but in this particular case whoever was standing on the other side of my office door was positively bleeding power. It was faint, but it was definitely there. I frowned. Either someone was trying to put out power on purpose as a misguided attempt to puff up their feathers, or someone with some serious mojo didn't know the first thing about reigning in and controlling their power. Both could potentially be big trouble, though for very different reasons. I only had a few seconds to go through my options before the knocking came again, louder and more impatient this time.

Putting my feet back firmly on the floor I checked to make sure that my force rings were topped off and that my shield bracelet was ready to go in case I needed them. If it was baddies on the other side of the door they probably wouldn't be bothering to knock, but you could never be too careful. Making note of where my staff and blasting rod were resting nearby I put on my best professional smile and called out cheerfully to my new guest. "Come in!"

There are a few seconds of hesitation before the the doorknob slowly turned and a young girl walked in. It was her age that caught me by surprise. She looked to be at the most fourteen years old, olive skinned with large, soulful eyes. The girl was tiny, dainty even, reaching only about Murphy's height. Unlike Murphy however she lacked any of the musculature and build that made the Special Investigations head way more formidable than she looked. The girl's eyes and hair were very dark, her thick hair falling in curling waves around her shoulders in a way that reminded me somewhat painfully of Susan's. My new guest might have looked like the perfect little Mediterranean doll if it wasn't for her nose; it was very Roman, prominent and maybe just a bit too large for her face. She was dressed in jeans, somewhat worn sneakers and a winter coat. There was nothing at all to differentiate her from a typical teenager at first glance, except for maybe being somewhat extra petite and adorable looking.

Of course, that was until you took into account the power that she was leaking all over my office. At the very lease I was pretty sure she was a mortal, both because of the feel of her magic and the fact that supernatural creatures tended to go for that idealized beauty look and not the regular American teenager look. Still, that did not mean that there was no danger to be be found here.

The girl, for her part, was just starting at me with a wide eyed look of surprise or almost... awe on her face. Was it the coat? It might have been the coat. I had it on because I'd been keeping the heat off in my office to save money.

Before things could get any more awkward with all the silent staring I made sure my best professional smile was still in place and then spoke up. "Hello, Miss. Is there anything that I can help you with?"

At the sound of my voice her eyes moved up to meet mine, our gazed briefly locking before she flicked her eyes away, right before a soul gaze could start. So she was aware enough to know of that particular phenomenon. Interesting.

"Yeah. Hey listen. Harry Dresden, right?" she asked, licking her lips. Her voice came out rushed and she sounded nervous.

My professional smile stayed firmly on my face. "The one and only." I resisted the urge to ask her where her parents were and what she was doing here out of school all by herself. That could come later. See? I had some tact.

"Dude, you gotta help me out. I can't use electric stuff anymore," she paused, looking hesitant and nervous before continuing. "I also kinda need you to teach me magic. Because if you don't, well... you know. I'll probably end up eaten by a fairy or something."

My professional smile slipped off my face as I examined the girl in front of me with renewed intensity. Well, she wasn't shy about dropping a bunch of bombs on my lap all at once now was she? When her feet started shuffling nervously I realized that I'd probably been quiet and starting for too long. Right. Well then. First things first in order of importance.

"Why don't you have a seat, Miss...?"

The girl swallowed nervously but moved to sit in the chair in front of my desk anyway. After she sat down she said told me her name in a low voice. "Rachel. My name is Rachel."

There could be any number of reasons for a girl refusing to give out her last name, so I reserved judgment on that. However something about her name triggered a feeling of that I should know it from somewhere. Filing that bit of familiarity away for the moment I dove straight for the most pressing question. "Rachel," I asked seriously, "do you have a reason to believe you are being threatened by something supernatural?"

"Well... I mean, not exactly," the girl hedged. "Nothing specific. But I've been warned that my magic is strong enough that it will eventually start drawing supernatural predators like flies. Shit," she said, suddenly throwing her hands up in the air and making a frustrated noise. "Apparently I can't even live in a house with basic things like electricity and a water heater anymore, let alone use a phone or a computer like any normal human being! I need your help Mr. Dresden. I'm kind of at my wit's end here!"

I just sat there and stared at her, cool on the outside but more than a little surprised on the inside. My first thought was that the girl – Rachel – leaking power all over the place was something to be suspicious of, but it is true that it _could_ simply be a new full-blown talent fully manifesting. However for power to be coming off her like a pungent odor meant her gift had to be strong. Very strong. _Extremely_ strong. Strong enough that she should easily be able to make the top one hundred wizards in the world in terms of power. Needless the say the odds of someone like that just walking into my office off the streets had to be somewhere in the ballpark of a million to one.

I had many, many questions for this girl. However I needed to take things one step at a time. I briefly considered using my Sight but decided against it. There was another way to more easily check more-or-less conclusively if her power was the real deal or if this was all somebody trying an elaborate trick.

"Miss Rachel," I said, learning forward and sticking my hand out with a challenging smile on my face. "I believe we missed getting properly introduced. That was my mistake. Why don't we shake hands so our introduction is all nice and official?"

The girl looked at me doubtfully, but to her credit she only hesitated briefly before sticking her tiny hand in my much larger bear paw. That was when I felt it. Whenever a practitioner touches another, if they know what to look for, they can get a ballpark sense of their magical potential, their potency, their Power. With Rachel that energy felt no different than I would have expected, no irregularities or magical surges that even hinted at any sort of foul play. Instead all I got was a taste of how strong of a practitioner she could be.

 _Wow._

While feeling out another practitioner this way was not an exact science, it was more than good enough for a general picture. The girl across from me was _strong_. In fact she was somewhere in the ballpark of how strong _I_ was, and that was without the benefit of a decade and a half of study and refinement. If I was like Mike Tyson in terms of magical muscle, then Rachel had the potential to become a Wookie on steroids. There might have been wizards in the world out there whose potential for magical muscle exceeded the girl's, but if they did then their numbers would definitely be counted in the single digits. In fact I'd be willing to bet you could count the wizards with that kind of potential on one hand with fingers to spare.

"What? Is there something on my face?" the girl asked with slightly narrowed eyes. It took me a second to realize I'd been staring and holding on to her hand for longer than was really appropriate. I gave her hand a firm up and down shake, doing my best to pretend nothing awkward had happened.

"Harry Dresden," I said quickly, once again putting on my best professional smile. "Pleasure to meet you."

Her bow-shaped lips twitched to one side in amusement. At least she seemed more relaxed now than when she had walked in. "Rachel Bicchielli. Likewise. I've heard _many_ good things about you."

That name... it was so familiar. I was sure I'd heard it before somewhere. Hopefully it would come to me soon if it was important.

I dropped her hand and examined her, thinking over this new problem that had landed on my lap. One, someone had told her that she was potentially in danger and had presumably told her to seek me out. No matter who it was, however, it was a good thing they had because Two... this girl needed to be trained. Badly. She was right that someone with that much power would bring predators and opportunists like flies to honey. In fact I would be surprised if some supernatural entity or group out there _hadn't_ already taken notice of her. Which brought up point Three... along with training, she was going to need serious protection. Someone with her power would be catnip for every breed and brand of supernatural predator out there. I couldn't help but take a deep breath and let out a sigh. Sometimes I helped out practitioners in the area by helping them learn to control their powers but this... someone like this would need to be taught in the context of a full on apprenticeship. There was no other way to harness a talent of that caliber. But Goddamn it, she was so young too. Too young for this kind of thing. Fourteen was still in middle school, right? No one that age had any business getting involved with the dangerous side of the supernatural out there.

In Rachel's case however, it didn't look like she was going to get much of a choice.

It was no choice at all for me though. If the kid needed help, I would help. However I wasn't comfortable with the idea of teaching someone who I wasn't sure would be responsible with the power they might learn from me. So before I made any kind of decision about what kind of help I was willing to offer the kid, there was one thing that I needed to do without fail.

"Rachel. Do you know what a Soul Gaze is?" I asked her calmly.

Recognition flashed in her eyes. "I know the theory, yeah. Can't say I've really had the guts to let it happen with anyone yet though."

 _Who did you learn the theory from?_ I really wanted to ask, but for the time being I decided it was better to stay on track.

"I'm going to be straight with you, kid: Whoever told you that you needed training was right, you do. I _might_ be willing to take responsibility for that. However before I can even think of agreeing to anything like that I need to get a feel for your character. A Soul Gaze is the best way to do that. Now I have to warn you... not everyone who has taken a look at my soul has had what you might call a good time. One woman even passed out. It's perfectly safe, but it can be... intense. Personal. And you never forget anything that you see in there. With all of that in mind, would you be willing to let me Soul Gaze you?"

I expected her to be hesitant, or even nervous. Instead she met my challenge with a strange little grin, like the idea of a Soul Gaze with me actually made her happy for some reason. There was something in her eyes that for a moment made her look a good deal older and more mature than her middle-school aged body would suggest. "Seeing the soul of the infamous Harry Dresden? Well, what fan of your work could say no to that?"

Filing that odd comment away for later I nodded. "Well, if you're sure. Whenever you're ready then."

She hesitated for a handful of seconds before boldly bringing up her dark eyes to meet my own. Her eyes were large and very expressive, currently showing eager anticipation along with a hint of nervousness. That I was the last thing I noticed before I felt a very familiar pulling sensation and the Soul Gaze began.

ooOO0OOoo

It was night time over a dark ocean, cold as the Bering sea, spreading out infinitely in all directions. There were dark clouds dominating the sky above, blotting out even a hint of starlight from the heavens. The sea raged as if in a storm, sometimes raining and sometimes not, the surface of the sea tumultuous as violent waves of all sizes – from a few feet to dozens of feet tall – churned and crashed into each other with no seeming rime or reason.

Then, in the middle of the ocean, I spotted it. A lone grey hare running on top of the water, dashing to and fro frantically as it tried to avoid the waves. On it's back was a tiny backpack and somehow I knew what it contained; memory and knowledge. They were the hare's most valued possessions and it ran to protect those objects as much as to protect itself.

However the chaos and fury of the ocean were too much for the grey hare to evade forever. Before long it found itself in a position where it no matter what it could not avoid getting smashed in between two waves. As I watched the hare was battered, the currents of the ocean and the waves dragging the helpless animal downwards into the ocean's black depths.

That was not the end of it however. A handful of seconds later, as if the hare were actually made of the same material as a life preserver, it floated up to the surface and was spit up into the air. Once again the hare landed on the ocean's surface and, seeing the fury of the ocean around it, once again began its terrified sprint to protect itself and the precious cargo it carried.

Again and again the hare would dodge the chaotic waves with agility and swiftness, but again and again it would eventually be caught and dragged under. Every time it came back up the hare seemed to forget that it was actually invulnerable to drowning. Every time it once again ran in fear, doing anything and everything it could to stay afloat just a little longer.

Wrong, right, it mattered little to the hare. This was not a creature of morality or principles. There was no room for that in its life. It might help you if it could, if there was room. At the end of the day though the most important thing was staying above the waves.

That was when I noticed it; something hidden and easy to miss. High up in the clouds, in the sky, every once in a while lightning would flash and an almost invisible figure would appear, brief and transient in the night. It was the size of the whole sky, barely existing like a rainbow yet at the same time exerting a subtle influence on all things.

I recognized the figure; it was Manjushri, the so-called Buddha of intelligence, knowledge and wisdom. Though barely existing it looked down at the hare with infinite compassion. It was not a dominant force in this sea yet. It might never grow to be a dominant force, one that was as strong as the storms and the cold and the waves.

But maybe one day, it could be.

Even if it didn't know it was even there, Majushri was hope for the hare. Hope to one day know peace. For so long as hope exists, things might one day get better.

ooOO0OOoo

The Soul Gaze ended as suddenly as it started, with a sensation of separation and pulling away. The end of a Soul Gaze could sometimes be a bit disorienting. I closed my eyes briefly and rubbed my face, trying to make sense of what I had just seen.

It was a relief to know with one hundred percent certainty that Rachel, strong as her power could potentially be in the future, didn't have the soul of a baby eating sociopath. However that had been one of the more tricky and ambiguous Soul Gazes I'd ever experienced in terms of trying to get a concrete picture of someone. Why the hare with a backpack full of memory and knowledge? Why so much emphasis on the idea of a never ending struggle? Some of it was more clear cut than that though. Rachel was a person who, on the surface, looked like she would always look out for number one when the chips were down. However when you looked closer there was another force there, something else at play but hidden, something more recent subtly driving her in a less selfish direction. Good or evil, it was hard to say she was truly one or the other, though maybe she was beginning to lean towards the "good". Like most young people there was a definite sense that everything was still fluid, prone to change. However so long as the hare didn't panic too much by getting drowned too often... she was probably going to turn out alright.

Not one of the worst Soul Gazes I'd ever seen by any stretch of the imagination.

I turned my gaze towards Rachel, finding her looking at me wide eyed and hyperventilating a little. That wasn't too unusual. What was unusual was that instead of looking horrified like some people had in the past she instead had this gigantic grin on her face as she looked at me. Huh. I actually found that a little bit creepy for some reason.

"Dude, you're like... it's like if Sailor Moon decided to become the Punisher."

I blinked at that. "What's Sailor Moon?"

The grin dropped off her face, and suddenly the look she was giving me was one of grave concern. "You've never watched anime?"

I raised a questioning eyebrow at that. "What's anime?"

The way her jaw dropped open gave me a hint that I would soon be finding out in detail exactly what this "anime" stuff was. Not that I wasn't curious, but now wasn't the time for that. I held up a hand before she could start on the type of long impassioned speech only a true fan could muster.

"Before we do anything else, we need to talk to your parents," I said to her seriously. "You're in what, eighth grade? Seventh? I'm glad that you came to see me but you probably shouldn't be skipping school in order to do so. Things will get a lot harder once you get into high school."

For some reason, Rachel grabbing a paperback off my desk and throwing it at my head with a frustrated scream of rage came as a complete surprise.


End file.
